Good Morning: Here we are- this close to being done with September and moving on to October. It’s Monday, so here we go:

• We’ll start with Google today: They’ve got a special site dedicated to their first 10 years.
• However, they still don’t know how to add.
• Sadly, Chrome is fading away.
• And Wal-Mart is killing your music for being honest.
• Adobe released Creative Suite 4. So much for just getting CS3….
• Fake popup study sadly confirms most users are idiots. Figures.
• And the Pirate Bay has been pirated. Hilarious.
• Moving on, Apparently the iPhone app business is a good one.
• And is the new 13-inch MacBook looking like it’s bigger brother?
• Finally, Rumors are spinning about a new Apple TV.

And that’s this week’s Manic Monday. By the way, ‘Gunter Glieben Glauten Globen”, it’s gibberish. Enjoy!

In the last few weeks, there have been threats to Internet Security, especially among sites that require your to login. With lots of questions about this subject, it’s time for the Top Five things you can do to stay secure on the net.

5.) Have an anti-virus and a firewall
This may seem like the most obvious thing you can do, but something a lot of people don’t. In the past few weeks, there have been some nasty internet bugs going around- some even disabling the entire machine- making so Windows has to be re-installed, and your data erased. Don’t have a firewall? Enable the Windows one- it’s good enough. Don’t have an anti-virus? Check out AVG.

4.) Are you sure that’s the real site?
Another problem lately is with sites like Facebook and MySpace. Accounts are getting hacked into because they are entering their information in a look-alike page. Just make sure your browser says “www.facebook.com” or “myspace.com” when entering info. Same goes for Online banking.

3.) Don’t open attachments unless you know who they’re from.
This is always a big problem. Open the wrong attachment and you have all sorts of problems. If you weren’t aware of the attachment- don’t open it.

2.) Be on secure wireless, if you can
Though it doesn’t happen often, passwords can get hacked if you are over unencrypted wireless. What to do? If you can, be on secure wireless. If you can’t, just don’t do anything very important (ie, pay your credit card).

1.) Make sure your password is secure.
This is the most important, yet often skipped precaution. Make sure your password has at least on capital letter and a number. Want to be even more secure, make sure it’s not a dictionary word. You can make it something obscure, like your Mom’s Second Cousin’s maiden name, as long as it’s not easy to figure out.

Those are my tips. Any others I missed? Put them in the comments.

I must apologize for not posting yesterday. It’s been a slow news week and, uh, a nap sounded really good. Sorry!!!

Now, on to today. Once upon a time, I told you about I Hate This Key, which would disable the Windows key. Turns out you can do the same thing with the registry editor.

1.) Go to Start >> Run >> Regedit.
2.) Backup. Backup. Backup. Did I mention to backup?
3.) Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Keyboard Layout.
4.) Find Scancode Map. If it’s no already there, create it- it’s a hexadecimal value.
5.) Set it to 00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,03,00,00,00,00,00,5b,
e0,00,00,5c,e0,00,00,00,00


Reboot and the change should take affect. Enjoy!

So there’s no Tom-Tom like application for the iPhone. That’s unfortunate, but I may have found the next best thing- iNap.

iNap uses your location-aware iPhone to set off an alarm to alert you when you’re nearing your destination. Say, for example, you’re riding the train to work but want to catch some shuteye on the way. Just fire up iNap, set your stop as the destination, and let iNap worry about the rest. You can tweak the alert radius to make sure you’re up in plenty of time, from 0.1 to 100 miles.

iNap works with any iPhone, but the results will be most accurate with an iPhone 3G. Keep in mind that you’ll want to make sure you have suffiant Wi-Fi coverage before relying on this. iNap costs $1 in the App store.

iNap [App Store via Lifehacker]

Good Morning! It’s Monday and you know what that means: absolutely nothing. Just kidding- it’s Manic Monday. Let’s get started.

• Microsoft had ditched Seinfeld for a I’m a PC. Great- too bad you don’t have Hodgeman.
• Stanford has launched free Computer Science courses. Wonder if they’re like the ones I pay for…
• Hackers have gotten into Sarah Palin’s email. Palin? I was thinking McCain’s but anyway…
• To please the Ubuntu users, Mozilla is going to remove the Firefox EULA.
• And Twitter has unveiled a new interface design. But will it stay online?
• On to Apple news, Millions of iPhone 3G power adapters have been recalled.
• The iPhone 2.1 software apparently is the new miracle drug.
• Rumorville: New MacBooks have begun to ship. Hmmm…
• And is Apple preparing a 32GB iPhone?
• Finally, how the Apple Genius really works.

That’s this week’s Manic Monday. I hope to have an opportunity to get some cool shwag this week- stay tuned.

“Yes” and “I don’t know”. Those will answer your first two questions: “Are you crazy?” and “What were you thinking”.

I’d better make it public. I bought the new iPod Touch. And I’ll tell you why I love it so much.

First thing’s first. It’s supper thin. The new back of the iPod Touch is almost exactly like the one on the iPhone 3G, except for the fact it’s sliver. And just as they say with the iPhone 3G, the new iPod Touch “fits better in your hand”. READ MORE »

One of the biggest complaints I’ve heard in the last few weeks is the new Facebook layout. While I’ve adopted to it, there are many who still don’t like it. Valleywag, of all people, have found a workaround to get back to the old Facebook.

1.) Add the “Facebook Developers” application (available here).
2.) Click “Go to applications” and then close the page.
3.) Follow this link

And viola, you should be on the old Facebook version. No idea how long they are planning on doing this, but you may as well enjoy it while you can!

How to go back to the old Facebook [Valleywag]

Here’s a sweet tip for you. If you are trying to be secretive and prevent people from logging into your computer, showing your user name in the start menu, I’m sure, doesn’t help. What do you do? Hide it!

1.) Go to Start >> Run >> RegEdit.
2.) Backup your registry. If you fry something you’re, um, fried.
3.) Go to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer
4.) Look for NoUserNameInStartMenu. If it’s not there, create it- it’s a DWORD value.
5.) Set the value to 00000001

Reboot, an presto- you’re user name is hidden. Want to switch it back? Just go back and change the value to 0. Hide away!

Once a upon a time (in a land far far away), I told you about Line Rider- the ultimate time killer. InXile Entertainment has made my list by releasing Line Rider iRide- that’s right, Line Rider for the iPhone.

Here’s what I said about Line Rider last time:

The basic concept is to draw one or more lines with the mouse on which a small character with a sled can ride. The game includes a physics simulation, which means the track must be sufficiently smooth to prevent the character from falling off the sled. The author has said that he prefers the description ‘toy’ to ‘game’ as there is no goal to accomplish.

One thing is for sure, this is my new favorite game- I just downloaded on my new 32GB 2G iPod Touch (review to come), and I just can’t get enough. The app is not free though- it’s a $2.99 purchase, but a $3 well spent, I think.

Line Rider [iTunes App Store]

Good Morning once again- A 16oz Expresso and a Mountain Dew later, it’s time for Manic Monday.

• Apple rocks out, announces new iPods, iTunes 8. Duh, how could you miss this!
• But the most important thing here, NBC is back on iTunes. The Office, anyone?
• Apple Pwns Pwnage, Pwnage Pwns Apple Back.
• And the Rumor of the week: New MacBooks on October 14th?
• And Microsoft? Yea, they’re going to copy Apple.
• Moving on, lead singer for Slipknot says the music labels cause piracy.
• And does Firefox’s “Private Mode” endorse something other than safe browsing?
• The newUbuntu 9.04 to be called Jaunty Jackalope. Huh?
• Why isn’t Ubuntu the number 1 operating system? I can think of a couple reasons.
• HP has broken the 24-hour battery life barrier. I guess HP stands for something now.