Over the last couple of years, I’ve become a big fan of the Open Source community and those companies offering users alternatives to high price commercial products.  AntiVirus software has become a huge money making business for companies like Symantic and McAfee (and countless others).  At $40 - $75 per year for antivirus subscription software, it starts to get a little ridiculous on how far you have to go to protect an operating system that should be better equipped to handle virus threats to begin with (ie. Windows)!

I have been using AVG Free AntiVirus software from Grisoft for a couple of years, and have been very happy with the protection it has provided me.  Also, since it just does antivirus checking and repairing, your system won’t feel as sluggish as it does when using Symantec or McAfee’s suite of products.  Combine those features with zero cost, and you have yourself one great free antivirus product for your personal PC.

In addition to Free AntiVirus software, they also offer Free Anti-Spyware and Free Anti-Rootkit software.

Over the last few months, I have read many articles that have warned people to avoid doing any unnecessary domain look-ups if they are not going to purchase them right away.  Apparently, various companies are monitoring the WHOIS database and other sites for the domain searches that are being requested.  By the time a user decides to go and register the available domain, it has already been purchased by automated systems.

As a way of combating this tactic, try to have various combinations of the domain you are looking for already figured out on paper before doing a search.  Be prepared to purchase your domain right away if it is available.  Waiting a day, or even hours, could allow computerized programs to automatically purchase that domain before you get a chance to.

I usually register my domains at 1&1.com since they have one of the cheapest prices on the web.  You pay only $6.99 for .com, .net, .org or .us top-level-domains (TLDs).  They also include free, as part of the domain fee, Private Domain Registration, ICANN Fee and a 2GB e-mail account.  Please take a look, you’ll find them cheaper than GoDaddy.com, Yahoo or Network Solutions.

As was widely expected, Chief Executive Steve Jobs announced Apple’s entry into the online movie rental business today.  What was a surprise, however, was that he managed to form alliances with all six major movie studios, including rival Sony Pictures and Universal, which stopped showing NBC Universal TV shows on Apple’s iTunes Store last fall.

Millions of people already use iTunes to download music or TV shows to their iPods, so online movie rental was an inevitable next step.  Films will be available through their iTunes store 30 days after release to DVD.  Initial prices are set at $2.99 for older movies and $3.99 for newer releases.  There’s also an option for a high-definition version for $1 more.  These movies will work on Macs, Windows-based machines, iPhones, iPods or Apple TV set-top boxes.

As an extension to the movie rental news, Apple also announced improvements and price reductions to it’s TV set-top boxes.  Now, $229, down from $299, these new boxes now allow you to rent or purchase content directly on a TV through the set-top box.

While Jobs did admit that there is competition from other online renters such as Netflix, Amazon and Blockbuster, he noted , “We’ve all tried to get movies over the Internet and to the TV, and we’ve all missed.”  Jobs is hoping “Round #2″ will go to Apple.

Apparently, MySpace and the attorney generals of 49 states are teaming together in an attempt to help protect underage children from online sexual predators.  At first glance, this sounds like a promising collaboration between the government and private industry.  However, when you read about their proposed plan, it’s almost silly.

New York Times - The social network will let parents submit the e-mail addresses of their children, so the company can prevent anyone from using that address to set up a profile. It will also set the profiles of all 16 and 17-year-olds to private, so only their established online friends can visit their pages - essentially creating a “closed” section for users under age 18.

In theory, if I want to protect my child, I would enter his e-mail address into the MySpace system thereby preventing a user profile from being created.  The problem is that today’s children are not stupid!  They are well aware that they can create a free e-mail account on Yahoo, Hotmail, and many other sites.  They’re certainly not going to tell their parents the e-mail address they’re actually using.

This reminds me of the age verification checks on adult web sites.  The first page asks you if you are 18 years or older.  It informs you that if you are not, you should leave.  If you are 18, please click here to continue.  Let’s face it, most young, adolescent teenagers are going to click the consent button and view the pornography.

I personally don’t think this program will amount to much as it is currently proposed.  There are just too many ways in which the system can be circumvented.  That being said though, I am happy to see that people recognize that there is indeed a problem that needs to be corrected.

It’s becoming an all to disturbing fact to watch the news and hear about some young child being molested by a sexual predator, only to find out they meet online, right under our noses.  I know it’s hard to keep track of your children every waking moment, but as parents, we must take the extra time to make our children aware of the clear and present danger that lurks on the Internet.  Please take the time to educate your children and help them learn to use good judgement while surfing the web.

Here’s a Netflix service that I only recently discovered while I was adding more movies to my movie queue.  Originally, Netflix users were allowed to watch selected movies online, but they limited the viewing time to about 17 hours per month.  Now, Netflix is expected to announce on Monday, January 14, 2008, that all rental packages, above the intro $4.99 package, will be able to watch unlimited Internet movies.

For those of us who enjoy watching movies on our PCs or laptops, this is certainly a welcome change.  However, current viewing is only limited to PCs and not Macs or Linux PCs.

This move was well planned by Netflix to take-away some of the lime-light from Apple’s anticipated announcement on Tuesday of it’s own move into online movie rentals.  Rumored price for Apple’s rentals is $3.99 for movies that are downloaded and watched within 24 hours.  Apple’s option does offer users a little more flexibility as to where they can play their movies.  PCs, Macs and the iPod devices should all be supported.

The real battle should occur later on this year when Netflix teams up with LG Electronics to introduce a “Netflix box” which will allow these movies to be played on TVs.  Apple already has a similar device which sells for $299 to transport video from computers to TVs.  No price has been announced yet for the LG device.

It appears that the British Educational Communications and Technology Agency (Becta) is advising against upgrading to Windows Vista and Microsoft Office 2007.  They feel that the upgrade would increase costs and cause potential incompatibility problems.

“Our advice is to be sure there is a strong business case for upgrading to these products as the costs are significant and the benefits remain unclear,” said Stephen Lucy, Becta’s executive director of strategic technologies, in a statement.

Ouch! We’re seeing more and more governments and organizations coming out against Windows Vista and other Microsoft products.  Microsoft makes much of their money through software licensing (especially their flagship products XP/Vista and Office) and you have to start to wonder about the long term effects these decisions will have on their profits.

Trust me, I’m not shedding any tears for Microsoft.  Sadly, I used to be a big fan of Microsoft, but it seems that over the years, they’ve lost track of their core competencies and try to get their hands into everything.  If someone puts out a product, they rush right out with a similar product of their own.

Becta also makes mention of Microsoft’s decision not to support the Open Document Format.  Instead, Microsoft went ahead with it’s own proprietary format called Open XML.  Just another way of Microsoft forcing the use of their products onto consumers.