October 2008 Archives

If you have used computers for any length of time, think about how many companies you know of that have been around for over a decade. I'm not talking about companies like Microsoft or Apple or even any of the application companies like Intuit. All of them have proven histories of course but I'm talking about the smaller guys, in this case PKWare. I've been using their products since the early nineties, most specifically PKZip for DOS and then Windows. They have really come a long way over the last 22 years since they were founded. PKZip was a must-have for old BBS system operators like myself back in the days before the World Wide Web came along and even now Zip is the standard for compression amongst most PC users. Linux fans will take issue with this and while I also like running Linux and use GZip compression Zip is much more well known.

Anyway, on to the reason for the post. PKWare is giving away a free non-commercial license for SecureZIP Express for anyone to download and you can also win some pretty cool prizes in the Decrypt and Drive contest such as a Honda Scooter, bicycles, a Nintendo Wii and Mario Kart for the Wii, gas cards and iTunes gift cards. You can play the game daily in order to try and win one of the great prizes but it needs to be on the computer that you have installed SecureZIP Express and the digital certificate.

To enter the giveaway you need to download SecureZIP Express at www.securezip.com and then go to www.DecryptandDrive.com to register.

One of the really cool things about using SecureZIP Express is that you can compress and encrypt your files using a digital certificate so that whoever the file was encrypted for doesn't need a password. It's a nice way to carry around files on an SD card or USB drive. Remember the old days of carrying around files on floppy? Thank goodness those are gone :)

Anyway, head on over and download SecureZIP and enter to win their giveaway.

I run a tech site. It's just a small blog where I will occasionally post news and videos and such. I have never intended for it to be one of the huge gadget blogs, don't consider it a 'contender' or anything like that. I just enjoy writing. I also run a very specific site targeted toward HTPCs and home automation, two of my hobbies. As a result I surf tech sites a couple times a month looking for cool new gadgets or software that I might be able to use or that I might want to post about.

It's about time they took the gloves off and released this. H/T to Red Alerts Blog for pointing me to the video. I'm cross-posting this to several sites as well.

Winmodify is another site that has a bunch of cool skins and also offers plenty of community news on an ongoing basis. Well, today they turn five so head on over and wish 'em a happy birthday!

The Blackberry Storm should be out at the beginning of November at some point. Vodafone will have it as will Verizon. I have heard four different release dates for the Verizon version ranging anywhere from the 1st to the 11th. Suffice it to say it will be sometime in November :)

Judging from the pictures of the dummy model sent out to Verizon stores it's not too much bigger than the pearl. I've been waiting on my next upgrade and this may just have to be it.

I don't seriously consider the G1, running Google's Android, an iPhone killer. I don't use the iPhone mainly because of the lack of a keyboard, bluetooth or the fact that there is no 3G service where I live, yet Verizons high speed network IS out this way.

CBS has this report and compares the two.

Do you use either one and if so what do you think? Shoot me an email and I'll post some of the results here. Sorry about comments being turned off right now. Eventually they will go back on.

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

Due to the huge amount of comment spam I have been getting over the last few days I have turned off comments temporarily. It's not as if I have been doing anything on the poor neglected blog lately anyway.

I have all but stopped doing the paid links and nonsense posts now and will sooner or later get back to posting actual technology related posts.