Just like the emails that once promised free money from Bill Gates for participation in a Microsoft email beta test, reposting a Facebook status isn't going to produce money from thin air anymore than forwading a chain email message would have done in years past. And yet, the same people who are now savvy enough to junk the email forwards and scams into their Deleted Items folder in their inbox are blindly reposting status messages such as these as if they're the gospel truth.

Urban legends have filled our inboxes for years on end. Before the days of technology, these same stories were idly passed around via chats at the water cooler and over-the-fencepost gossip sessions with fellow neighbors. It's said that the tales tap into a society's dark underbelly by posing as cautionary tales about the dangerous world we live in (AIDS from a gas pump! A hook-handed murderer!), or they simply tap into our deepest hopes and dreams. (You can get rich quick! You just have to forward an email!). Legends like these may change over the years, but they will always be around in some form or another and they won't be disappearing any time soon.

Watch Out, You're Being Spied On!

Another recent message making the rounds warns of something called "Unnamed app," a vicious little bot that's supposedly slowly down Facebook while also spying on your activities. While there is some truth to the fact that Facebook applications have an unworldly amount of access to your personal data, this particular app is not a rogue spybot secretly tracking your moves, it's just your everyday, run-of-the-mill software bug. And Facebook fixed it. But that probably won't stop thousands from "helpfully" passing this message onto their Facebook friends for days (if not weeks and months) to come.

Your Account Will be Deleted Unless...

These viral status messages, brand-new creations about internet dangers and free money, aren't the only hoaxes to find their way to the social space. Older urban legends have also been re-crafted to now fit the Facebook era. Take, for example, the warning passed around in the early 2000's regarding the "overload" of people signing up for Hotmail accounts. According to this missive, Hotmail was over capacity and Microsoft needed to dump some people from the system. In order to prove you were still an active user, you were asked to forward the email to every Hotmail contact you had so that your account would not be deleted. Essentially a harmless prank, this warning transformed itself over the years, reappearing in various forms that threatened the accounts of Yahoo, then AOL, Friendster, Orkut, Bebo, and MySpace users alike. Today, that message is again being circulated as a Facebook status update. The new lingo? It's not "please forward" anymore - it's "Copy+Paste." Because if you don't, you know, your Facebook account will be deleted. Yikes!

In this case, the fear of losing Facebook access has led many users to repost the warning on their own walls, where it's seen by friends who pick it up and pass it around too. But again, there's no truth to this message either.

An Urban Legend or a Deeper Truth?

While the above hoax speaks greatly to our society's increased reliance on technology, how strong those ties are and how fearful we are of being without them, others play on even deeper emotions. The Facebook story about their $1-at-a-time donations might not be true (side note: the company has set up a Disaster Relief page for those interested in legitimate ways to help), there's a photo of a Haitian cross whose existence is harder to prove or disprove. Circulating via Facebook right now is this photo of a stone crucifix still left standing in the wake of the utter destruction that was the Haitian earthquake. That one's real, right? Well, maybe so, maybe not. Ever since the creation of Photoshop, answering questions like these have gotten much harder to do. What matters though, is not the photo's veracity (or lack thereof), but the fact that, to some, it seems to hold a deeper meaning about the nature of God - how he's still there even in times like these. For Christians, it's an image of hope in a world of suffering. And by reposting it time and again via Facebook, it's spreading virally around the globe.

It's precisely these emotions - our fears, our hopes, our desires - that urban legends tap into. And while some are more harmless than others, it can be difficult to know the difference between the truth and a false claim, as this above example clearly shows.

Think Before You Post

So what can you do? Athough we're no longer deluged by the well-meaning warnings and fables that arrived via our email inboxes, we're still being subjected to their far-out claims. It's just that the medium is different. Once again, it's time to be vigilant. Just because you saw it on Facebook, that doesn't make it true. Just because the message comes via a trusted friend or family member, that doesn't make it worthy of reposting. Take a minute to think about it, use common sense, run a quick Google search if unsure, and then decide if that story is one to pass on.

As Mike Melanson pointed out yesterday, the lack of a camera in the iPad is potentially a "killer" issue for this once highly anticipated device. Without the ability to capture images and video, the iPad looks a lot less functional than the netbooks Steve Jobs happily ridiculed as "cheap" on stage during the event. Cheap they may be, but at least video chat is possible! Even the Facebook app he demoed - the same one ported over from the iPhone - is missing key features: the ability to post photos and videos shot with your mobile device.

But while the camera's omission is troubling, all hope is not lost. According to some early looks at the iPhone/iPad's SDK, there's an interface for a camera already implemented. In the Contacts application found in the kit's emulator, for example, you can tap the "Add Photo" button to add a picture to go along with the contact information. After doing so, a pop-up appears asking if you would like to "take photo" or "choose existing photo." Really, take photo? Of course, this is by no means definitive proof that the camera is coming to the next gen iPad - Apple could have simply reused the iPhone's Contacts app in the iPad emulator and forgot to remove this option. However it's likely that, if anything, a camera will be the next big feature added in order to encourage sales of iPad 2.0.

2. Voice Calls to Come Later

Another possibility for future iPad editions is that the (hopefully then webcam-enabled) device will also offer another critical component necessary for the implementation of video chat: voice. Although the iPad touts a microphone and speakers how exactly voice chat will be implemented is still anyone's guess. The most logical choice, though, would be to allow for VoIP functionality via an app as opposed to a full-on cellular voice plan and the accompanying monthly bill that would require. Instead, allowing for VoIP apps would be something that could be added to any iPad model - even the entry-level Wi-Fi-only one.

Plus, the iPad SDK reveals clues that this, too, could be coming in the future. Unless Apple just got really sloppy putting together the iPad emulator, then the "Touch to return to call" option that appears in some emulator screens could easily be a hint of things to come.

3. Annotations for iBooks

One thing the Kindle has going for it in the realm of e-books is its ability to allow for bookmarking, highlighting, and annotations of text. Not mentioned during the iPad demo's of iBooks? Those three same features. In fact, no "use case" for education was even presented during the presentation and no giant e-textbook was projected on the screen behind Jobs' head.

Yet these features are especially are important in selling an e-reader, especially if you want to convince college students to buy the device. Today's students, who mark up their text books with notes and highlighting, would have little use for an iBook's "read-only" nature. That means if iBooks are ever to compete with Kindle e-books, Apple will have to add in more interactivity in a future version of the iPad. Until then, colleges are likely to hold off on recommending the device to students, just as they're doing now.

4. Hold out for Verizon

While there is no proof that Apple intends to end their exclusive contract with AT&T in order to offer a CDMA version of the iPhone (and now the iPad), there have been ongoing reports that the two companies are talking. Well, at least according to anonymous "sources," that is. However, journalists covering the tech beat aren't the only ones touting the imminent forthcoming Verizon partnership - analysts are saying so too. According to Canaccord Adams analyst Mark Misek, a Verzion 4G iPhone model will arrive in June. Will a Verizon iPad soon follow? Possibly. But even if it doesn't arrive by iPad 2.0's launch, you'll still have plenty of other features to dull the pain of having to sign up - yet again, iPhone owners - with AT&T.

5. Wait for Multitasking via OS 4.0

Finally, there is the OS component. The iPad is built on the operating system that powers both iPhone and iPod Touch devices, iPhone OS. The current version of the tablet runs iPhone OS 3.2, but not, as hoped, a newer version of that same OS, version 4.0. According to sources, iPhone OS 4.0 is said to offer a new way to run applications in the background - via multitasking. This feature, notably left out of the current operating system due to battery drain, says Apple, is a key selling point for the company's latest competitor, Android, the mobile OS designed by Google.

However, in a somewhat overlooked bit from the iPad announcement is the news that the new device runs Apple's own processor, the A4. This new, speedy, high-performance 1 GHz chip is also touted on Apple's website as a "low-power system-on-a-chip." Not only does this proprietary tech make the iPad "crazy fast," its ability to use less power could mean that it will - you guessed it! - not drain the battery as fast as before.

So why not let the iPad multitask right out-of-the-gate then? Because Apple wants to push the "multitasking" update to all its iPhone OS 4.0 devices at the same time. That means cramming a smaller version of the A4 into the power-hungry iPhones and iPod Touches then announcing that those people with the new devices can multitask thanks to the new technology. Speculation? Sure. But possible? Definitely. Of course, you probably won't need new iPad 2.0 hardware for this - the feature will come via a software update and likely even sooner than iPad 2.0. It will just sweeten the deal when you get ready to buy the 2nd generation tablet device.

Let the Early Adopters Have This One

So unless you're an early adopter, serious Apple fanboy or girl, or fortunate enough to have a good bit of disposable income for gadget buys, holding out for the next generation iPad may be worthwhile if all the above come to pass.

That being said, those of us who pen reports such as these are already emptying our piggybanks and counting our change in anticipation of the iPad's arrival in Apple Stores. We won't hold it against you if you do the same.

So why would you want to hack your Android phone? For those with older handsets, rooting the device lets you install customized ROMs which can deliver major speed improvements and performance increases. For example, the popular CyanogenMod, created by one of Android's most notable hackers, optimizes performance for both the G1 and MyTouch 3G handsets.

Another good reason to root your phone? Multi-touch. One of the surprising omissions from Google's own Nexus One handset, for example, is the ability to use more than one finger at a time to operate the device. Although available on iPhone from the start, the Nexus One excludes this valuable feature from its mobile operating system. Why? No one knows for sure, but it might have something to do with some patents Apple owns. But that's no matter to the hacker community. Thanks again to cyanogen, Nexus One owners can enable the feature by copying some files over to their device. Other Android owners can perform similar procedures to enable multi-touch Web browsing. But before you can get started with any of these hacks, you first have to root the phone.

How to Root Your Android Phone

However, for novice hackers, "rooting" the phone sounds like it may be easier said than done. Although seemingly intimidating, by following a few simple steps anyone can do this with ease.

Before getting started, remember to back up your phone, including your contacts, SMS messages, files and photos.

1. The first step is to download and install Superboot, a boot image that, when flashed, will root the device the first time you boot up. You can grab a copy of the Superboot zip file from the Modaco forums here.
2. Once downloaded, extract the files it contains to a directory on your computer, just like any other zip file.
3. Now put your Android phone in bootloader mode. (Note, owners of a retail N1 should see instructions here).
   • To do so, turn off the phone, remove the battery, and plug in the USB cable. When the battery icon appears onscreen, pop the battery back in. Now tap the Power button while holding down the Camera key.
   • For those whose Android phones have a trackball, you have an even easier method of doing this: Turn off the phone, press and hold the trackball, then turn the phone back on.
4. Depending on your computer's OS, do one of the following:
   • Windows: Double click "install-superboot-windows.bat"
   • Mac: Open a terminal window to the directory containing the files, and type "chmod +x install-superboot-mac.sh" followed by "./install-superboot-mac.sh"
   • Linux: Open a terminal window to the directory containing the files, and type "chmod +x install-superboot-linux.sh" followed by "./install-superboot-linux.sh"
5. That's it, your device has been rooted!

If those instructions confused you, check out YouTube for instructional videos instead. Here's one for rooting the myTouch 3G or G1, and here's one for the Motorola Droid. Here's another. There's also an alternative rooting method involving 1 click demoed here. You get the idea.

Now What?

Now that you've rooted your Android phone, you can get busy adding features, functionality and other hacks. This is the fun part! LifeHacker offers five great reasons to root your phone, for those wondering why you would bother to do this.

Our favorite reasons?

1. Multi-Touch

First of all, Nexus One users can enable multi-touch on their devices. RedmondPie has a good how-to on this:

Meanwhile, Droid owners can hack their phones for multi-touch Web browsing:

T-Mobile G1 owners can do this too following the instructions here.

2. Mods for Performance Improvements (and More)

G1 and myTouch 3G owners can follow this tutorial to install the popular CyanogenMod on their devices, which boosts performance and speed, among other things. Here's a video tutorial on this via AndroidandMe.com: 

If you need more information, visit the Cyanogenmod Wiki for all the details on this custom ROM. And stay tuned to the latest Cyanogen news via this website. 

3. Extra Apps and Features

For more fun hacks, try these:

Anyone with a rooted handset can set up Wi-Fi and Bluetooth tethering using this app. The ever-popular Apps2SD software lets you migrate your Android apps over to your SD card, freeing up room on your phone. You can also install custom themes, ringtones and alerts.

More?

If you've hacked your Android phone, share your tips and tricks in the comments. Or if you have links to other good hacks, let us know.

Like any other Google Chrome extension, all you have to do is click the blue "Install" button to add the button to your Chrome web browser. Once installed, the RWW extension alerts you when new articles are published on our website very much like how the Google Mail Checker Plus extension alerts you to new mail in your inbox - by displaying an unread count next to the icon. When you click the button, the article list will appear featuring the headline, the first couple of sentences, and social sharing buttons for posting to Digg, Facebook, and Twitter using bit.ly-shortened URLs.

If that's all the extension did, those features alone would make it worthy of praise, but it goes even further. You can also customize the button to only display notifications from the areas of the website you're interested in. So for example, if you want to receive alerts when there are new posts on the business-friendly ReadWriteEnterprise and ReadWriteCloud but not the more consumer-focused ReadWriteWeb itself, you could check those two boxes and uncheck the rest.

Finally, an included search box at the top lets you sift through the ReadWriteWeb archives for older posts using our site's own custom search engine.

The ReadWriteWeb News Notifier checks for updates every 60 seconds, so you'll never miss out on the news. Although we didn't design this extension ourselves, we couldn't have done a better job if we tried. A big thanks goes out to the guys over at idio - we love our extension. Every website should get one of these!

Once installed, HipLogic users can access the included free applications like Facebook, Twitter, CBS News and Sports, Entertainment Tonight, Disney, and WeatherBug as well as other various apps for monitoring news, finance information, and RSS feeds. As expected, the Facebook and Twitter applications allow for status updates, however they don't appear to be as robust as the applications found in either the Windows Mobile or Nokia Ovi stores. Take the Facebook application, for example. The Windows Mobile version integrates with the phone's camera for uploading of photos and videos. Nokia's app does the same. HipLogic's version, on the other hand, appears much more basic.

HipLogic, Before & After

In addition to the included applications, there's also a HipLogic app store where even more applications are found, both free and paid. The software also works as an alternative web browser of sorts as users can pull up a search box with a click and perform Google searches without ever having to launch the phone's browser.

Another App Store?

Given that some of the platforms HipLogic aims to support already offer their own application stores - and both Nokia and Windows Mobile allow background applications, too - it's somewhat confusing as to what problem HipLogic is trying to solve here. While it's true that HipLogic's software is designed to provide real-time notifications, those notifications will only appear when the alternative HipLogic UI is running.

On the plus side, however, HipLogic does provide one single access point for all your apps. When you launch HipLogic, you can get to everything that's been downloaded and when it's closed, you return to your phone's regular UI. And if the software, a JavaScript virtual machine platform, can be installed on more low-end "feature phones" in the future, it could indeed bring an iPhone-like app store to those who wouldn't otherwise have access to mobile applications.

Acer, currently the world's second-largest computer vendor, mentioned the application store among a series of initiatives designed to boost the company's profitability, according to a report on Bloomberg.com. From what it sounds like, Acer is glomming onto every major tech trend with plans that include everything from an e-reader to a Tablet PC. In fact, Acer chairman J.T. Want even admits this is the case: "We'd like to proactively purse any opportunity," he said.

One of those opportunities is the new Acer application store, an online venture that will offer hundreds of different applications, both free and paid. However, the company wouldn't share pricing details or name developers, noted the Bloomberg story.

Although application stores are typically associated with mobile phones, Acer wouldn't be the first vendor to launch an applications store designed for use on PCs. Earlier this month, chip maker Intel launched the AppUp site, an application store designed specifically for netbook computers. Interestingly enough, AppUp is meant to be a white-label offering that PC manufacturers can customize to their own needs. At the time of its launch at this year's Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Intel announced several partnerships with other PC makers to bring the AppUp store to consumers. Included among those launch partners was Acer. Gianpiero Morbello, Acer's worldwide marketing VP said that by accessing the AppUp catalog, their company would be able to distribute "innovative software downloads to Acer Atom processor-based netbook customers and move to easily support additional Acer customers on any device powered by an Intel processor."

So Is This Yet Another App Store?

However, despite the sparse details surrounding the upcoming Acer app store, it does sound like the manufacturer is planning their own venture of sorts. Intel's store only supports Windows netbooks and the Moblin Linux operating system - not mobile devices like Windows Mobile or Google Android and definitely not Google's new netbook OS, Google Chrome.

Intel confirms that the previously announced joint venture is still on, with their company providing behind-the-scenes support for infrastructure, testing, and validation of apps. And while Intel isn't privy to Acer's other plans, it does appear that this would be a separate store from whatever Acer is envisioning for the other platforms outside of Atom-based netbooks.

It's understandable that Acer wants to generate some hype surrounding their products by offering an app store to their customers, but at this point they may be simply confusing the issue. Many of the platforms Acer plans to support already offer their own application stores - even Google's Chrome OS, the Web-based operating system set to launch by year-end. And, of course, one could argue that the Internet itself has been the app store for Windows computers for many years now.

But the researcher doesn't blame Adobe for the issue - the company informed programmers how to address the vulnerability years ago. Instead, this problem has to do with the "how the developers at Twitter, or whoever did this, built the Flash applications," Bailey told a reporter at InternetNews.com.

According to a post on the Twitter Status blog, the company has exercised "an abundance of caution" in disabling access to the widget as they have not yet heard about any accounts being affected by the reported vulnerability. However, says Bailey, there's no way of know if any users were ever impacted by the issue and, if so, how many. "That is one of the big scary things; if they are being attacked, there is almost no way to find out short of a very close examination of the server logs or client logs, which generally aren't stored," he said.

This is by no means the first security issue for the microblogging startup. The company has seen everything from DNS hijacking to the theft of corporate documents and even fell victim to a distributed denial-of-service attack which affected other social media properties on the web including LiveJournal and Facebook. Twitter users have also had their accounts hacked and have had to deal with the constant threat of internet malware posted to the site via shortened links. If anything, a news story about yet another Twitter security threat almost seems like a non-event these days, given how many issues the company has faced over the few short years they've been in operation. But considering current Twitter's status as a piece of our modern-day's communication infrastructure, it's unnerving to hear about issues such as these...especially considering how this one in particular should have been addressed from the get-go.

Pay to Play: H.264 and its $5 Million per Year Fee

According to Mozilla's vice president of engineering, Mike Shaver, this issue is more than a simple choice about picking the right technology for the job. It's about principles. Supporting the H.264 video codec means paying licensing fees to an organization called MPEG-LA, a group that charges $5,000,000 annually for the codec's use. But it's not the cost to their organization that Mozilla is worried about - it's the cost to the developers, distributors, and anyone who wants to create video content on the web. "If H.264 becomes an accepted part of the standardized web, those fees are a barrier to entry for developers of new browsers," Shaver writes on his blog. "I want to make sure that there are no toll-booth barriers to entry for someone building a whole new browser, or bringing a browser to a whole new device or OS, or making and using tools for creating standard web content."

In other words, the decision to support or not support the codec isn't just about technology, it's about where the web is going and what it should be. And in Mozilla's eyes, that means free, open, and available to anyone.

But Will End Users Care?

Unfortunately, Mozilla's idealism won't mean much to the end user who may soon discover that YouTube videos don't work in their preferred browser. And once they learn that switching browsers solves the problem, the years they spent loyal to Firefox will be forgotten in the need to have functional video.

Interestingly enough, one of the browsers where the H.264 encoded videos will work is Google Chrome, the up-and-coming browser that's also the basis for Google's new web-based operating system, Google Chrome OS, due out later this year. The new browser is already nearing a 5% market share as of December (according to Net Applications) - a notable chunk given Chrome's lack of support for Mac and Linux-based machines until only last month. Ironically, it's Google, typically fellow supporters of an open web, that is pushing the H.264 format's adoption. Their choice to move forward with this codec on YouTube, a Google-owned property, has a major impact on the web as a whole.

There's Still Hope

But even though it looks as if Google's choice is pushing the web towards this pricey format, Christopher Blizzard, Mozilla's Open Source Evangelist, reveals there's still hope. According to an article in The Guardian, Blizzard says that there's a chance that H.264 will not be Google's final choice in the matter. There's good reason to believe that Google is purchasing On2, a technology whose capabilities exceed that of H.264, he says. If that occurs, Google will likely license it royalty-free. Whether or not Google does so remains to be seen, of course, but we hope that Google will remember their motto, "don't be evil" when the time comes. Until then, Mozilla stands alone at a crossroads, sticking by their principles, supporting the open web...even if that choice one day leads to their downfall.

In layman's terms, this workaround lets Safari display Flash content...some Flash content...on the iPhone. But the process of enabling it to work requires quite a few modifications to the original Flash file. And while the concept is intriguing, anyone who actually bothered to use this on a live website would probably get criticized by users for killing the iPhone's user's battery - the script is a major CPU hog.

For obvious reasons, Adobe can't officially sanction the project as a way to sneak Flash onto the iPhone where it's currently prevented from running per Apple's restrictions. However, they said applaud the interest and enthusiasm shown by their developer community and that this demonstration "shows the potential of what users want to be able to experience on the iPhone." Still, they warn that the Gordon project "represents just a limited subset of what the Flash Player can do," mentioning specifically that without the necessary codec support, you would not be able to playback videos. For example, you would not be able to playback FLV videos encoded using the On2 VP6 codec. You also might not be able to play back F4V content either, unless the H.264 encoded video could somehow be extracted and then played back in QuickTime on the iPhone outside of the application or website.

Whether or not Apple plans to ever lets a proper version of Flash run on the iPhone is still unknown. At one time, we heard that Adobe was working on an iPhone-only version of Flash, but as of yet nothing has surfaced in that regard. Abode's current solution to the problem is a new release of their Flash Professional CS5 software which lets developers export their files as iPhone apps.

In the meantime, Flash developers interested in checking out the Gordon technology can view the demos hosted here or the source code here on github.

The maps created by the company are geo-coded to the real world, allowing you to see their exact location as pins on a map in relation to other area landmarks and infrastructure like roads and parking lots. You can search for a particular indoor map using the included search box (for example, "IKEA") or, once the map is loaded, search within the app for a particular section (for example, in IKEA you could search for "desks").

Another great feature about Micello's application is that the maps are cached for offline use. That's useful for those wanting to save maps of their favorite spots for when they're without a connection - in fact, Micello offers a "favorites" feature that does just that. Plus, it makes sense considering that cell phone reception is often poor to nonexistent when inside large structures. Without a signal, you could be out of luck if it wasn't for this feature. Frequent fliers will also appreciate the app's offline capabilities since they'll be able to scope out the route to their next connection before the captain announces the use of portable gadgets is once again permitted.

Future Plans

For now, Micello is working on building out their map database but they soon plan to integrate other sorts of information within their application, too. Down the road, you'll be able to see data like flight information when you're in an airport map or a conference agenda when you're browsing a map of a convention center. This is where Micello's business model comes into play - the company could charge businesses and other organizations wanting to annotate their listings with additional information.

While Micello is only available as an iPhone application for now, the company plans on offering versions for other mobile applications in the future as well as a Facebook application. Those interested in trying the new service can download the mobile app from here (iTunes link).

Update! Micello tells up they have another 500 malls in the works now and will be adding 50 more today. In total, the 750+ locations will cover a lot of U.S. and some of Puerto Rico. Airports will be next - they'll launch Las Vegas by the weekend and then another 25 in next 2-3 weeks.

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We took a look at the options Google suggested and have summarized the features, drawbacks and pricing information below. In addition, we also reviewed one other application not specifically mentioned in the Google blog post that may be of use to those moving to the cloud-based service.

Memeo Connect is a desktop application available for both Mac and PC (XP and higher) which lets you view files on both your desktop and within Google Docs. In the software program, files and folders already online are downloaded to your computer. Local files not yet online can then be moved to the appropriate Google Docs folder via drag-and-drop. The service is relatively simple to use as it presents your documents in an easy-to-navigate window while also incorporating Google's online features like starred files and shared folders.

One major drawback to Memeo Connect is that there's no automatic synchronization option. That means you can't monitor a local folder or folders for new files or changes and then have those documents seamlessly synced to Google's online service. This feature should arrive in a future update, however, so don't let its lack of inclusion be a deal breaker for you if the service fulfills all your other needs.

For personal users of Google Docs, the biggest drawback to Memeo is that the service is only available to users of Google Apps Premier edition, a business-level version of the service which also offers calendaring, groups, Web site creation tools, and video sharing to corporate users for $50 per user per year. Memeo Connect itself costs an additional $9/year.

2. Syncplicity

Syncplicity allows a Google Docs user the ability to access, manage, sync, share, and backup their files online. The downloadable software program seamlessly integrates with Windows Explorer for file management purposes. (The Mac software beta program was discontinued in July of last year but the company tells us they're working on an entirely new version right now.) The Explorer integration is a decidedly helpful feature for those who don't want to change the way they already work.

In addition, unlike Memeo Connect, automatic synchronization is possible. And that synchronization isn't only with Google Docs - the software can also sync files to its own website as well as other computers running the Syncplicity software. That means your files are not only available on other machines, they're backed up in multiple places online too. Another benefit to Syncplicity's service is its "restore" feature which lets you undelete files using their Web application. Those accidentally deleted files are immediately restored to your PC's hard drive with a click of a button.

Syncplicity is available in multiple versions for anyone using Google Docs. A free personal edition provides 2 GB of online storage for up to 2 computers while a $15/month personal edition offers 50 GB of storage for up to 5 computers. Businesses can sign up for a separate plan which starts at $45/month for 3 users and goes up from there.

3. Offisync

Offisync is a Microsoft Office plugin which integrates Google Docs directly within your Office software. (See our earlier review here). This is useful for those who only want to upload specific files to Google Docs instead of automatically syncing entire folders. Once installed, the plugin adds an additional menu to Office's software (either Office 2003 or 2007) where you are provided with buttons which allow you to open, save, search, collaborate, and email your Google Docs files.

The software works on Windows PCs and is available for personal users of Google Docs or Google Apps. An Enterprise version provides the same functionality to business users by providing integration with Google's website building software, Google Sites, a service which provides a simplified alternative to SharePoint.

With any one of the three tools above, you can easily transition from a desktop-based computing environment to one where your Office documents are created, managed, and maintained in the cloud. However, it's important to note that Google Docs isn't the only online office suite available. Companies like Zoho, Adobe, ThinkFree, and others also provide online alternatives to Microsoft Office. In addition, Microsoft itself recently launched its own Office Web Applications into beta.

If you're a user of any of the programs mentioned here, let us know about your experiences. Would you recommend one program over another? Are there features you would like to see added? Share your thoughts in the comments below.

Since Websense's acquisition of Defensio a year ago, the company has been working on building this next generation product, which originally functioned as a simple spam-blocking tool used by blogs. As before, the Defensio software uses Websense's ThreatSeeker Network, a technology that incorporates both automated computer analysis and human intelligence to protect against Web-based security threats in real-time.

Now Defensio is going beyond simply providing protection for various website and blogging platforms with their Facebook protection feature. This extra security operates by way of a Facebook application. When you sign up to try the new software, you give the product permission to access your profile in order to block malicious content as needed. Like any other Facebook app, installation is as simple as entering in your Facebook sign on credentials and hitting "Allow" on a few pop-up windows.

Configuring Your Protection Level

From the software's Account Management page, you can check or uncheck the type of content you want to restrict from being posted to Facebook or your blog. URLs can be blocked by category like Security (hacking, phishing, spyware, etc.), Legal Liabilities (adult material, gambling, etc.), and more - or the feature can be switched off altogether. You can further customize the protection by entering in keywords to block, just as is typically done with blog comment spam protection systems. You can also enable or disable an executable file blocker and a script blocker which prevents scripts and links to executable files from being posted to your Facebook profile.

Doing Business on Facebook? Take Note

While this system will obviously appeal to any Facebook user concerned with security, the real market for this type of software is with the companies that use Facebook for professional purposes. These days, everyone from major corporations to mom-and-pop shops have set up their own Facebook pages for marketing purposes. Facebook is even being used in place of traditional websites in some instances. Take, for example, the recent commercial for the upcoming movie "When in Rome." Instead of referring you to a traditional URL like wheninrome-movie.com, the commercial touts the Facebook page: facebook.com/wheninrome as the only place to view the trailer and movie information online.

Clearly, big businesses have a lot to lose if malicious software or objectionable content made its way onto their Facebook pages. Besides the bad press involved with being the source of a malicious attack of some sort, the companies would suffer something even worse (at least in their opinion) - no one would visit their page. That will make the Defensio suite a very appealing option for many companies, no matter what the expense.

Pricing

For now, those interested in demoing the software can do so for free. The company website currently lists monthly pricing starting at $5 a month for less than 100,000 comments (or wall posts). That should suffice for those wanting to run the software for personal use. However, the real money is in the business licensing. Those with 100,000-300,000 comments are charged $15 a month, and those with over 300,000 comments must purchase enterprise licenses. Here, the first three licenses are $50 a month with each additional license costing another $35. However, Websense admits that pricing levels may be adjusted after the beta period ends. While these rates are reasonable for the protection being offered, at this point Websense could practically charge anything they want since no other company offers this sort of automated protection for Facebook profiles.

If you're interested in testing the program yourself, you can sign up for a free trial here.

Those of you who edited your privacy settings prior to December's change have nothing to worry about - that is, assuming you elected to keep your personalized settings when prompted by Facebook's "transition tool." The tool, a dialog box explaining the changes, appeared at the top of Facebook homepages this past month with its own selection of recommended settings. Unfortunately, most Facebook users likely opted for the recommended settings without really understanding what they were agreeing to. If you did so, you may now be surprised to find that you inadvertently gave Facebook the right to publicize your private information including status updates, photos, and shared links.

Want to change things back? Read on to find out how.

Probably the most critical of the "privacy" changes (yes, we mean those quotes sarcastically) was the change made to status updates. Although there's now a button beneath the status update field that lets you select who can view any particular update, the new Facebook default for this setting is "Everyone." And by everyone, they mean everyone.

If you accepted the new recommended settings then you voluntarily gave Facebook the right to share the information about the items you post with any user or application on the site. Depending on your search settings, you may have also given Facebook the right to share that information with search engines, too.

To change this setting back to something of a more private nature, do the following:

1. From your Profile page, hover your mouse over the Settings menu at the top right and click "Privacy Settings" from the list that appears.
2. Click "Profile Information" from the list of choices on the next page.
3. Scroll down to the setting "Posts by Me." This encompasses anything you post, including status updates, links, notes, photos, and videos.
4. Change this setting using the drop-down box on the right. We recommend the "Only Friends" setting to ensure that only those people you've specifically added as a friend on the network can see the things you post.

2. Who Can See Your Personal Info

Facebook has a section of your profile called "personal info," but it only includes your interests, activities, and favorites. Other arguably more personal information is not encompassed by the "personal info" setting on Facebook's Privacy Settings page. That other information includes things like your birthday, your religious and political views, and your relationship status.

After last month's privacy changes, Facebook set the new defaults for this other information to viewable by either "Everyone" (for family and relationships, aka relationship status) or to "Friends of Friends" (birthday, religious and political views). Depending on your own preferences, you can update each of these fields as you see fit. However, we would bet that many will want to set these to "Only Friends" as well. To do so:

1. From your Profile page, hover your mouse over the Settings menu at the top right and click "Privacy Settings" from the list that appears.
2. Click "Profile Information" from the list of choices on the next page.
3. The third, fourth, and fifth item listed on this page are as follows: "birthday," "religious and political views," and "family and relationship." Locking down birthday to "Only Friends" is wise here, especially considering information such as this is often used in identity theft.
4. Depending on your own personal preferences, you may or may not feel comfortable sharing your relationship status and religious and political views with complete strangers. And keep in mind, any setting besides "Only Friends" is just that - a stranger. While "Friends of Friends" sounds innocuous enough, it refers to everyone your friends have added as friends, a large group containing hundreds if not thousands of people you don't know. All it takes is one less-than-selective friend in your network to give an unsavory person access to this information.

3. What Google Can See - Keep Your Data Off the Search Engines

When you visit Facebook's Search Settings page, a warning message pops up. Apparently, Facebook wants to clear the air about what info is being indexed by Google. The message reads:

There have been misleading rumors recently about Facebook indexing all your information on Google. This is not true. Facebook created public search listings in 2007 to enable people to search for your name and see a link to your Facebook profile. They will still only see a basic set of information.

While that may be true to a point, the second setting listed on this Search Settings page refers to exactly what you're allowing Google to index. If the box next to "Allow" is checked, you're giving search engines the ability to access and index any information you've marked as visible by "Everyone." As you can see from the settings discussed above, if you had not made some changes to certain fields, you would be sharing quite a bit with the search engines...probably more information than you were comfortable with. To keep your data private and out of the search engines, do the following:

1. From your Profile page, hover your mouse over the Settings menu at the top right and click "Privacy Settings" from the list that appears.
2. Click "Search" from the list of choices on the next page.
3. Click "Close" on the pop-up message that appears.
4. On this page, uncheck the box labeled "Allow" next to the second setting "Public Search Results." That keeps all your publicly shared information (items set to viewable by "Everyone") out of the search engines. If you want to see what the end result looks like, click the "see preview" link in blue underneath this setting. 

Take 5 Minutes to Protect Your Privacy

While these three settings are, in our opinion, the most critical, they're by no means the only privacy settings worth a look. In a previous article (written prior to December's changes, so now out-of-date), we also looked at things like who can find you via Facebook's own search, application security, and more.

While you may think these sorts of items aren't worth your time now, the next time you lose out on a job because the HR manager viewed your questionable Facebook photos or saw something inappropriate a friend posted on your wall, you may have second thoughts. But why wait until something bad happens before you address the issue?

Considering that Facebook itself is no longer looking out for you, it's time to be proactive about things and look out for yourself instead. Taking a few minutes to run through all the available privacy settings and educating yourself on what they mean could mean the world of difference to you at some later point...That is, unless you agree with Facebook in thinking that the world is becoming more open and therefore you should too.

The White House announced the release of a new White House iPhone app via a late-night blog post on WhiteHouse.gov. Included in the mobile application are features like news items, photos, blog posts, videos, and even live video streaming. That's right - live video. According to White House blogger Dave Cole, the app lets users watch public events like speeches and press briefings in real time using their mobile device. Next week's State of the Union address by President Obama will kick off this effort, delivering live video of the speech to anyone running the free application on their Apple iPhone or iPod Touch.

This downloadable mobile application (iTunes link) is the first of its kind to be released by the current administration... that is, unless you count the Obama campaign's iPhone application, which offered mobilized access to campaign news, media and events prior to the election. The Obama administration is notable for the way it's embraced technology, using everything from YouTube for weekly "fireside chats" to wikis for recruiting purposes. They even licensed the transition site Change.gov using Creative Commons, which allowed a company called Cerado the ability to translate the site into a Web-based iPhone application.

What's most interesting about this new mobile effort is the fact that the iPhone application was launched prior to the mobile-ready version of WhiteHouse.gov's website. While that effort is "coming soon," says the blog post, it won't be available in time for Obama's next presidential address, and there are no details as to whether or not it will offer any sort of video features, much less live streaming.

Of course it's important that the government's efforts aren't iPhone-only, but it's clear that the Apple platform is an important part of the administration's efforts to reach its constituents - especially the young, tech-savvy mobile users who some say helped Obama win the election.

Mobile Web's Explosive Growth

Also of interest: The White House states that mobile Web use has grown over 100% in the last year in the U.S., and higher worldwide. That's putting it mildly. Over the past year, we've heard from numerous companies and analyst firms regarding the explosive growth of the mobile web. For example, in spring of 2009, Opera reported a 157% increase in usage of their Opera Mini web browser and a 319% increase in year-over-year data traffic. AdMob released a report in October revealing a 19% increase year-over-year in iPhone/iPod Touch data traffic alone, and last month, analyst firm IDC predicted over a billion mobile web users by 2010. Ignoring the mobile masses at this point would be a mistake and it's clear that the White House understands that. Notes the blog post: "this is just the first step for WhiteHouse.gov's mobile platform."

3 Billion in Apple App Sales? Not Exactly

While we're sure the general trend is correct as far as the growth of mobile application stores and Apple's position as the market leader, we have to agree with the note that John Gruber recently made on his blog regarding these figures. He quotes a portion of the report where analyst Chris Foresman says:

Earlier this month, Apple announced that sales had topped 3 billion; that means iPhone users downloaded 2.5 billion apps in 2009 alone. Gartner's figures show another 16 million apps that could come from other platform's recently opened app stores, giving Apple at least 99.4 percent of all mobile apps sold for the year.

Gruber notes that Apple didn't actually announce 3 billion in sales, they announced 3 billion downloads. In fact, you can see the original press release making this announcement here. Not only that, but another Gartner analyst Miguel Fontanez told us earlier this month that Apple, as a rule, does not disclose App Store revenues as a separate line item in their revenue reporting. That means that any estimation of Apple's App Store sales are just that - an estimation.

Last week, in speaking with Peter Farago of Flurry analytics to calculate App Store piracy numbers, we determined that Apple had generated approximately $750 million in sales to date. That's 3 billion downloads over the lifetime of the App Store with roughly 25% of them being paid downloads. In other words, if Gartner used the 3 billion to determine Apple's position as the market share leader in sales, then their calculations would be off.

However, as Gruber also notes, if Gartner's calculations are accurate regarding the other mobile platforms (16 million in app sales, they claim), then it's clear that Apple still has the app store to beat... even if they don't account for 99.4% of the market.

We don't expect Apple's dominant position to change anytime soon - the company has momentum. In November 2009, Apple announced they offer over 100,000 applications and by now that number has likely grown even more. However, other mobile application stores are growing quickly, too. Google's Android marketplace, for example, with its open nature unhampered by any sort of bogged-down app review process, has now topped 20,000 applications as of December. The Android mobile operating system is growing in popularity, too (usage increased 3% over the past three months), meaning it will soon be a contender for a hefty slice of that the app store pie in years to come.