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The kerfuffle over employers asking for the passwords to workers' and candidates' private social media accounts just won't go away. While it's not clear exactly how widespread this practice is, lawmakers around the country are already drafting bills that would outlaw requiring facebook logins. Many people clearly find the very idea intensely creepy and invasive.

I certainly do. Or did. As my initial knee-jerk horror fades a bit, I'm starting to see at least some situations where employers might have a legitimate right to that information.

Assume for a moment that you don't own an iPad. Which device do you want more: a new, multitouch-endowed Windows 8 notebook computer, or a new iPad with the vastly improved resolution? Okay, so the latter is available now and the former is not. But if you have already acquired that iPad, or are just about to, will you want that Win8 Ultrabook come October?

These are serious questions for serious people, and it's a good thing that ReadWriteWeb knows their numbers. We've convened the Panel of Esteemed Grown-ups (PEGs) to take up the issue of Windows 8's success against Apple's iOS-based steamroller. Joining us for the discussion (left to right):

Ross Rubin, Executive Director and Principal Analyst, NPD Connected Intelligence
Al Hilwa, Program Director for Applications Development Software, IDC
Sarah Rotman Epps, Senior Analyst for Consumer Product Strategy, Forrester
Carmi Levy, Correspondent, Yahoo Finance Canada; Contributing Technology Analyst, CTV

The job of stealing your personal data is now a fully-fledged industry - in some regards, one that is becoming terrifyingly legitimized. Earlier this month, security experts with Verizon gave reporters at the RSA Conference an advance look at detailed forensics data, compiled with the assistance of the world's law enforcement agencies including the U.S. Secret Service. That data indicated that industrialized data center incursion has become mechanized, is happening regularly, and has the goal of compiling a more comprehensive "big database" about your personal transactions than Facebook or Citicorp ever dreamed.

"Most of these automated attacks are almost exclusively on small businesses," says Chris Porter, Verizon's senior security analyst and co-author of its annual Data Breach Investigations Report (DBIR), whose 2012 edition was published this morning. "There's some franchise chains, but many times it's mom-and-pop cafés. These restaurants, retail stores, are really focused on building their business. They want to make sure when a customer comes in, they can charge him. And they're probably less concerned about data protection."

When it comes to naming Windows anti-virus vendors, is Microsoft's Security Essentials one of the vendors on the tip of your tongue? Well, it should be, at least according to OPSWAT, the anti-virus tools vendor. In their last market share report released this week, their share rose to nearly 15% of the North American market, making it the top single product. Symantec owns more market share as a vendor but spread across several different product lines.

Remember when computers were cool and printers were boring peripherals? Well, these days there seems to be fewer and fewer differences between the two devices.

At least HP seems to think so. Reports are circulating today that the hardware giant plans to combine its not-all-that-profitable PC division (you know, the one the company's last CEO wanted to spin off) with its high-margin, market-leading printer operation.

Having an extra $100 billion lying around isn't a bad problem to have. And I don't have an issue with Apple's decision today to use some of that cash stash to pay dividends to investors and to buy back some of its stock.

But doesn't that decision also indicate a lack of attractive companies for Apple to buy? I mean, $100 billion is a lot of money and you would think there would be something out there worth owning in that price range. Apparently, Apple doesn't think so. Or at least it doesn't think there are any companies out there worth the price. And what does that say about the state of the technology industry?

By now you probably know that Pinterest is one of the fastest-growing social communities around. Aside from sharing those cute cat pix, it can also be an attractive proposition for small businesses who want to get the word out about their products, particularly very visually-arresting ones. How do you know if Pinterest is right for your business? The folks at Intuit put together this flowchart. I liked the no-nonsense decision points represented here, and in general agree with their recommendations.

If you are in the market for an enterprise social networking tool and haven't yet considered Yammer or Jive or Socialtext or the dozens of other competitors out there, there is a new version 3.0 of Neudesic Pulse that might be worthy for you. It will be announced next week at the Microsoft Convergence conference, and the reason is clear: they offer the best integration with a variety of Microsoft services to their social streams. (We noted that Yammer had SharePoint integration for more than two years here.)

Tomorrow, thousands of people are going to head out to Apple stores to pick up a shiny new iPad, or wait eagerly for delivery of the latest tablet from Apple. While the attention is on the new iPad, though, what about the original device that helped propel Apple past Microsoft as the world's most valuable tech company? Two years later, did the early adopters get their money's worth?

OK, technically it's not quite two years. The first iPad went on pre-order on March 12, and users got hands-on with the iPad on April 3rd, 2010. But, for my purposes, the additional couple of weeks isn't going to actually make a substantial difference.

We have written before about video sharing service Wistia and enterprise social networking service Yammer. This past week both have added richer analytics to their offerings. If you presently use either or both of them you should start seeing the new features automatically. If not, it might be a good time to investigate what both offer.