Geekly Update - 25 July 2011

The AskBobRankin Geekly Update

And so the rivalry begins. Facebook removed a Google+ ad posted on its site that Michael Lee Johnson hoped would gain him some friends. They then banned him from placing more, while Michael deleted his account to use Google+ exclusively.

Trekkers will love beaming up to CBS' official Star Trek PADD, a $5.00 app for iPad. The "Personal Access Display Device" contains info and footage from the TV show, movies and animated series that can be accessed via onscreen keyboard.

Sixteen people were arrested in the US who supposedly are part of the Anonymous hacking group as was one in London who may have ties to LulzSec. I suggest extradition to a country that still uses the rack.

Gone are the days when students will have to eat Ramen for years to afford textbooks as Amazon provides them the luxury of renting for up to 80% off. Scholars can keep them for periods of 30 to 360 days and have the use of Whispersync so they can take notes and keep them on Amazon's cloud.

Turntable.fm is a party in your PC with DJs that inhabit user-generated chatrooms and play music. The site already boasts 300,000 fans and you can get in on the beta action if you have a Facebook friend that already belongs.

Friday the ITC ruled that HTC Android’s user interface infringes on two of Apple’s iPhone patents. The decision on the suit, taken out in March, will now be reviewed by a 6 member Commission before further action is taken.

Hackers, weep. New Windows Live Hotmail users will have to come up with a stronger password for their accounts that hackers cannot find by running through a dictionary. No longer permitted is the ever popular '123456,''ilovecats' or the easiest to crack, 'password.’

Apple’s OS X Lion went on sale this week at the App Store and sold over a million its first day out. About 250 new features include more multi-touch options, AirDrop file transfer and Launchpad, an icon-based app launcher.

Still have relatives that don’t have computers? A startup called Snail Mail My Email will actually handwrite them and send them off. Volunteers do the work and if this catches on, it may be a cross between voluntarily letting others know details of your personal life and helping to keep the USPS afloat.

Google Labs is being shut down. The company refers to this action as "prioritizing our product efforts" but I see it as a loss for users.