Dear Steve Jobs, the Mac Will Never Overtake the PC and Here's Why

Apple's Macintosh was touted as a revolution in computing because it boasted a graphical user interface. However, from the beginning, the Mac has been fighting an uphill battle likely due to a poor marketing strategy. But with Steve Jobs' arrival at Apple, the Mac has turned around and has regained some of its market share. It will never take over top spot though and here's why.

5. It just isn't that great

It's true. I know all the humorous Mac vs. PC commercials have gotten you thinking many bizarre things but the Mac just is not that good. You probably think that the Mac never crashes, it's good at handling photos and movies, it's got an easier-to-use interface and just about everything else. However, the PC has things to compete with virtually every aspect the Mac thinks its got going. iPhoto, Apple's ultimately awesome photo software has absolutely nothing on Google's Picasa and Windows Photo Gallery. And iMovie has nothing on Windows Movie Maker. That's not all though, there's tons of excellent freeware on the internet that only work on PC.

4. Abnormal

Most people have used a PC for a majority of their computing. They've gotten used to the simple and surprisingly convenient interface of the friendly PC. But then Mac comes along, decides to take away a button from the mouse, put a weird little bar of icons on the bottom of the screen and tweak just about every little thing the PC has done over the years. While Apple thinks it's being innovative and making everything cooler, consumers are just shaking their heads in confusion. And again, many software and computer games are incompatible for Mac because of its "innovation".

3. Impractical

Even most Applers admit that Microsoft Office is a much more effective system than Apple's iWork. The thing is that most people don't want to "create a beautiful document"; they want to create a professional document. So Office beats iWork; that basically wipes out students and business people as potential customers. And what does that leave? I mean, for most people, the prime use of a computer isn't just to play around creating little songs with GarageBand or fiddling with the cool features of iPhoto.

2. No reputation

When you see a guy holding a MacBook, you think "young, creative, eccentric", which might be good for an artist or an actor. And I'll admit, if you're an artist, a Mac will probably cater to your needs more effectively than a PC. However, a great majority of people want to get that professional look holding a smart HP laptop. And if you're trying to close a deal and invite a potential client into your office full of Macs, they're probably going to think, "This is pretty fishy, I don't know if I want to do business with this sort of an odd person."

1. Price

This is without doubt, the one thing that's hindering the Mac from having success. If I can get one of the average, sorta OK Macs for $1000 and I can get a PC with tons of storage, a bunch of RAM, a 20" monitor and a touch screen for just as much money, I'd probably opt for the PC. In addition, with the economic downturn, people aren't going to throw $1000 away at something just because it's cool. On the other hand, maybe these same people will buy a thousand-dollar PC because PCs don't have a reputation for being unreasonably expensive.

Why Everyone Loves to Hack Websites and Software (But Mostly Google)

Let's face it, everybody's wanted to hack a website at one point in their life. Being able to take advantage of a page's flaws just seems so awesome. I mean, wouldn't it feel good to be able to hack such a huge site such as Google. But this isn't some random coincidence that everyone wants to hack; it's psychology.
Hacking seems extremely cool because you are able to feel like you're in control and you've triumphed and have the upper hand. This is especially true during an economic crisis where everyone's only experiencing loss and loss and loss. And this rule even works if what you've just pulled off was just a little trick that doesn't actually do much.
But also, it's a lot like get-rich-quick schemes (or what I like to call online jobs); you have this little feeling in your heart that this might just result in something absolutely incredible that will change your life. Of course, usually, this doesn't happen but easy routes to success never grow old.
And this isn't just some hunch that I have. It's backed up by solid numbers: On the trusty Google Trends (which displays traffic for major search terms in the Google system), lists the term "hack google" with more search traffic than "Mississauga", the sixth largest city in Canada. But here's an interesting stat; 8 of the top 10 countries in searching for "hack google" are part of Asia, with Indonesia taking top spot. This translates to English being a mere fourth in the languages that "hack google" is searched in.
Now, site owners are relatively smart ;) and they've really exploited the fact that people love to hack. People are labelling virtually every tiny little manipulation as a "hack", this Blogger-related site being a testament.
So people, stop hacking!

Micrsoft Windows Vista's Windows Speech Recognition: What Hasn't Been Said About the Voice Recognition Program

There was a fair amount of hype surrounding the Windows Speech Recognition that comes standard with Windows Vista. However, this quickly died after several tests gone wrong and poor reviews galore, broadcasted across the web and on multiple television channels.
People have grown addicted to posting YouTube videos criticizing Microsoft's speech recognition engine. We've seen them speak quite clearly into a decent microphone and watch random words pop up on the screen, time and again. Clearly, it sucks when speech recognition programs don't work and your boss asks you what you mean by "fast pendulum unholy compact unicycle".
But, clearly, we all know the advantages of speech recognition engines and uses of them when they're accurate.
And I'm here to tell you that Windows Vista's standard Windows Speech Recognition software works. If you're an Apple fanboy, you're probably pretty pissed off just at the fact that I complimented Microsoft. But it is true (and by the way, I don't really like Apple).
Of course, it is not 100% effective and doesn't work miracles. After all, it isn't ObamaWare, it's software from Microsoft and you know it's going to have its flaws. In addition to that, it's a free speech recognition software as long as you purchase Windows Vista. You don't hear the phrase "free speech recognition software" very often so be very grateful of Microsoft's contribution.
Obviously, if you want to go ahead and throw $300 at Nuance's Dragon NaturallySpeaking, widely known as the best speech-to-text program out there, you can, and you will get results. But if you'd rather spend that $300 on something else, just stick with Microsoft's version.
An introduction of it for those who haven't tried it is that they'll run you through a training program that picks up your voice's characteristics for improved accuracy. This is after they do a quick configuration of your microphone. This training program will tell you all the little quirks and is incredibly easy to understand from a Microsoft thing. You can open applications, click on web links and of course type with full functionality with Windows Speech Recognition, something most other freeware can't brag about.
And then you're off and running: You say start listening to get it to start working and stop listening to get it to pause for a little while. It's pretty simple.
And as long as you're in a considerably quiet room you're good.
When you see all those videos showing the software's flaws, ignore them. They just have crappy microphones. Personally, I use a headset microphone, the "Microsoft LifeChat LX-3000", which works like a charm. But when I don't want to wear that, I find that a RocketFish desktop microphone is great too.
YouTube users who waste their time making dumb videos showcasing Microsoft's errors aren't the smartest people in our population. Don't listen to them. Windows Speech Recognition is fine. So I say, keep dictating (you'd understand if you had the program).

Top 10 Stupidest Windows Vista Sidebar Gadgets

The post I made yesterday talks about the best and most useful Windows Vista Sidebar Gadgets. This one is the opposite. This one talks about those useless gadgets that just serve to take up space on your hard drive:

10. Currency, unit conversions

First of all, half of these aren't even up-to-date with the constant exchange rate changes in terms of currency. But, I'll admit, you may come across a time when you would like a currency conversion and such a gadget would be great, if only it were accurate. However, this is not the same with unit conversions. No average person, has a sudden realization that if he knows how to convert centimetres to inches, his life will be better (sorry, this is the first thing that came to my mind). So forget unit conversions at least, please.

9. Mini-radios

I don't want to listen to India's news or British 88.5, if I live in Canada. If I seriously want radio, I'll either listen to a station that actually has something to do with me. Plus, with the not-that-recent advent of iPods as well as computer media players, there isn't much of a need for a radio, let alone a radio Vista gadget.

8. Countdowns

Ah, aren't these cool to take a look at once in awhile. No. Do you really need to know that there are 324 days until Christmas, or better yet, 243 days until Good Friday? You'll know when these things come; you don't need some geek who made the gadget telling you when Christmas is. And if you're actually customizing these countdown clocks to your birthday or something, get a life.

7. System control

Seriously, if you have this gadget installed, please get a treadmill and lay off the McDonalds for a little while. If you're lazy to the point where you can't even move your mouse to click on the start button and proceed to click the "Shut Down" function or something of the sort, then it'd be healthier for you not to have a computer.

6. Application launcher

Refer to number 7. Again, you can't just click on the application name on the start menu or even glance to the left and double click the icon on your desktop? May I inform you that sitting by your computer all day munching on Lays and drinking Fanta pop is not good for you.

5. Bobbleheads, animated flags, optical illusions etc.

This seems to amuse some people but doesn't really do it for me. I like Obama but I'm not going to express my support by downloading a virtual bobblehead. And downloading an animated flag is not showing that you're patriotic, it's showing that you're stupid. I don't even want to talk about optical illusions.

4. Anything in safety and security (i.e. terrorist alert, password generator)

I click on the "Safety and Security" category of the Windows Live Gadget Gallery and the first one that I see is "Terrorist Alert". To begin with, I don't trust something hosted by Microsoft with terrorism alerts. Secondly, if you're the type that downloads system control or application launcher, you probably won't be willing to get out of your seat anyway. Just keep munching, don't worry that Osama's knocking at your door.

3. System Usage

You'd better be pretty geeky to care about "system usage". For the most part, ordinary people neither care about, nor understand what "64% computer usage" and "45 GB of hard drive space left". You can buff it up with cool graphs and numbers but I refuse to download this gadget.

2. Date/clock

What the hell. If you download this, you are literally as low, if not lower than the group that downloads system control. In terms of the clock, move your pupils downwards and to the right to look at the digital clock provided instead of peering the second hand moving on a fat orange cat. But here's the hard part for you people out there. To get the date, you'll have to move your mouse all the way down the same place that you just gazed at and put your mouse over it (not click it).

1. UFO news

I just had to mention this one. UFO news. Let me just say that if you still believe in UFOs, you must have been hiding in the well for way to long. You must realize that they don't exist. Now, I'll just tell you some of the description: "Get the latest news on Ufo's, Alien abductions, Cattle mutilations and Crop circles on this planet from 80 of the worlds top researchers and radio programs." Alien abductions? Cattle mutilations? You've got to be kidding me.

If you want useful gadgets though, the best ones are listed here.

Top 10 Best and Most Useful Windows Vista Sidebar Gadgets for an Average Joe

For the computer geeks out there this is not for you. That means, if you go on the computer at 6 AM in the morning to check your email, 9 AM to check Facebook and spend all day working on Microsoft Word then come home to play Warcraft, leave. Now. However, if not, you're welcome to take a look at the 10 applications that I personally find most appealing:

10. Blogger Buddy

Simply enter an account username and password and you'll be off and running. Direct links to all the blogs correlated with that account will be provided. Plus, you can compose full posts with many of the necessary formatting accessories including emphasis, hyperlinks and pictures. In fact, you can even preview the post right from the gadget before you publish. The one flaw that I've found is that you can't insert labels into the posts from this gadget.

9. Dictionary/Thesaurus

I don't care what you do for a living, there are those times when you just need a definition, spelling or synonym that you can't seem to find in your head. That's when this very simple but useful application will come in handy. It's dictionary is definitely useful although it has its flaws, with most of its entries originating from the Webster's 1913 dictionary and an odd interface but the thesaurus is surely adequate and sure is better than the few words that Microsoft Office's thesaurus provides.

8. Desk Essentials

Like a pizza, this is a lot of good stuff crammed into one thing. A detailed to-do list that features organization by priority and due date, an easily accessible notepad as well as a decent calculator that will solve small equations. In addition, it's nice to be able to print out the to-do list and notes too.

7. SportsAlert

This gadget has a ton of versatility listing scores to every NBA, NHL, NFL, MLB and NCAA basketball game. It's reliable with occasional updates but there's not much more to say; it's just a good application.

6. News

It doesn't really matter what you want here. I'm just throwing this search term out there. Most versions already have a news reader installed but you might prefer a particular brand of news, perhaps the USA Today.

5. WeatherBug

Although I don't personally like this particularly, it's consider a basic essential that you just have to have. You can set your location very easily and this gadget will retrieve temperatures, satellites, photos, wind gusts, precipitation and HI/LO reports daily.

4. Facebook Sidebar

At this point, pretty much everyone has a Facebook account. Well with this application, you can satisfy your craving for a constant view of Facebook updates. This displays messages, pokes and all invitations as well as friend requests. Moreover, you can update your status as long as you authorize this action.

3. zCalendar

This is a very cool gadget, which, along with showing the date (my favorite part), lets you add events, which you can customize with your own notes. To add, this application will play a little chime as an alert if you enable it at a set time before the event starts.

2. All Search

Type in any search term, select a search engine from the list that includes Google, Yahoo!, Live, eBay, Amazon, the weather, dictionary, Youtube and Wikipedia. This will instantly open your Internet Explorer taking you to the search results page for the particular engine. Really easy, really convenient.

1. Email

Ah, email. How can you forget this. I can't pinpoint you to the exact gadget because I don't know what service you use. But you need this. Trust me.

5 Ways to Get Free Songs for Your MP3 Player

These days, music isn't exactly the cheapest commodity. In fact, Apple's iTunes charges you $1 for every song you download but I didn't have to pay a single cent for any of my 770 MP3s. Here's how you can do the same:

5. Wait for gifts.

This is not the easiest or most reliable solution. You'll have to wait for Christmas or your birthday and it's not fun listening to 20 songs until one of these occasions. However, doing this definitely works and you won't have to pay for your music.

4. Keep an eye out for free song promotions.

Occasionally, Pepsi or Lays might put out a promotion where you can win free songs every time you buy one of their products. This is a very grueling and time-consuming process and isn't exactly free but it serves its purpose.

3. Search for free songs on the internet.

Just go to Google and search for "free songs" or something like that. This will bring up a bunch of results (20,000,000 to be exact) that literally give you free songs. Still, many popular songs that you may want to download will be unavailable at these sites. If this is your choice though, I'd recommend eMusic.

2. Use the Google cheat.

Many people don't know this useful little "hack". To employ it, type the following into the search bar:
-inurl:htm -inurl:html -inul:asp intitle:"index of" .mp3

1. Download Limewire.

This is a file-sharing program that lets people download shared MP3 files for free off of other users. Almost every song in the world is on this software in addition to the many other file types. On the other hand, often the files that are on this applications have malicious viruses that can harm your computer but these aren't very strong so pretty much any firewall can destroy them.

The Blackberry on your Desktop: Windows Calendar

If you've looked over the idea of upgrading to Windows Vista from lousy XP (hopefully, you have not lost your sanity and bought a Mac), then here's another reason to do so: A convenient event organizer, by the name of Windows Calendar, has arrived. No more having to settle for the complex mechanics of any online calendar or even worse, using pens and paper. You've got all that in an application on your computer, that comes standard with any Windows Vista package.
Sharing the aesthetic interface of all Vista components, Windows Calendar is as easy-to-use as it gets. Quickly, you can create a new task/appointment, which you can detail with locations, descriptions, times and even reminders.
Also, the innovative three-column design lets you speedily catch a glimpse of everything in your demanding schedule. In addition to that, if you have a lot of things to do, a search bar is exactly what you need to save a few extra minutes.
And here's another handy feature; Windows Calendar is fully compatible with the often used iCalendar format so you can effortlessly subscribe to web calendars- maybe the programming schedule of your favorite TV station- or even publish your own calendars to the web.
As well, if you need more than one calendar to cover your day-to-day life, you'll be glad to know that this application can support up to 100. Moreover, you can share any of these calendars with your family or friends through email invitations or directly within your computer.
Naturally, as with all Microsoft software, there's a simplistic guide to get you off and running. So what have you got to lose? Try it.

10 Reasons Why MSN Chat Sucks

Most people I know would never even think of uninstalling their favorite little program, MSN. Well, here are a few reasons you should do so, before your life is ruined.

10. You can't take back things you say.

People might take a comment badly or you may say something that would offend someone. Of course, if you do something to embarass yourself, the news can spread like a wildfire because of the Internet.

9. It's an easy pathway cyber-bullying.

MSN encourages cyber-bullying with its interface and soon, you may be the victim of a vicious attack.

8. If you decide you want to chat with a robot, there's tons of advertisements.

This application has to be one of the most popular out there; every company wants to get their hands on one of these advertisements and some of them lead to surprisingly obscene sites.

7. Alerts.

You know those little pop-up boxes at the side of your monitor whenever something happens. That gets to be pretty annoying. Although you can stop them, this still comes as a huge downside and even frustrates people to the point where they just want to smash their computer.

6. You become dependant on MSN for all of your contact and scheduling needs.

This may seem petty but one day, it might come and bite you in the butt. If anything happens to your precious little MSN, you're dead.

5. Obligation to talk.

Here's a big one. When one of your friends is on and starts chatting with you, you can't just abandon them and sign out. That really sucks when you have a big assignment due at school the next day.

4. From the people that I ask, I see how addictive MSN really is.

Like a force of nature, MSN begins to ruin lives, dominating everything. It will terrorize you and your future but you can stop the madness. So if you or a loved one is in trouble, call MSN Users Anonymous. Fully confidential and very helpful.

3. It might be subtle, but MSN is very unhealthy.

First of all, sitting there all day "chatting" isn't exactly the best thing you can do to your body. And of course, think about your eyes; don't they deserve a bit better than to be sentenced to hours of the computer screen?

2. MSN takes up a lot of time. Really. A lot.

When you get obsessed, you can spend days of valuable time just trying to fill lines or expressing your emotions with little colored circles. Think about what you can be doing with this time. Just right now I came up with, "write a book, watch TV, make a magazine, invent something and of course, change the world." I guess Barack Obama can't spend his time on MSN.

1. You don't have a real social life.

If you haven't gone insane yet, you'll probably recognize how lame nattering on MSN is. I seriously don't think this is "cool" or really makes you socialable. This is just an excuse for computer nerds, really.

Useful For The Most Professional Presentations: SIL Speech Analyzer

This freeware is extremely useful for anybody who wants to present that perfect speech, that will attract and stun audiences. SIL Speech Analyzer is one of the most advanced speech analysis software in the world that allows you to apply effects and analyze patterns.
Some of the many features include the ability to measure and graph frequency, spectrographic and spectral statistics for quick analysis. One can also analyze the properties of musical recordings and slow or quicken recordings so you can clearly hear each of the patterns.
And of course, you'll be able to quickly pick up the lingo of this software with the useful help contents. Plus, this application is constantly being improved to make you happy.
So when your next presentation comes up, go check out SIL Speech Analyzer.

Top 10 Best Freeware

10. Audacity

A powerful sound editor that allows you to apply numerous effects and analyze recorded sounds

9. Wordpress

A blogging application that lets you express your opinion with many more tools than any web-based hosts

8. Youtube Downloader

A simplistic software that makes downloading and converting Youtube videos easy

7. Stickies

A desktop-based freeware that you can use to remind yourself of any important event, with the "stickies"

6. Limewire

A file-sharing application that permits you to download all of your favorite songs and videos for free.

5. iTunes

Apple's accompaniment of their iPod, selling top-quality music, videos and much more; extremely user-friendly

4. Desktop iCalendar Lite

Another desktop-based application that displays a small calendar, to-do and event list on your monitor for quick access and viewing

3. Google Toolbar

Blocks pop-ups, provides quick-links to several of the best Google services, allows you to search with Google even if you're not on Google and more.

2. Adobe Reader

Reads the highly popular PDF format

1. Internet Explorer

If you have anything other than this, I seriously suggest that you switch and if you aren't using the latest version, you should definitely upgrade to either version 7.0 or 8.0 (BETA)

The Best Free Photo Editor: Paint.NET

As the popularity of online photo-sharing rises, so too does that of photo-editing. After all, people want their images to be in top shape when they are posted onto the web.
The feature-rich Adobe Photoshop series is without doubt the #1 software but it comes at quite a price. The $500 that some pay, drives others crazy. However, even without this application, photographers and artists can make extremely high-quality pictures with Paint.NET.
Paint.NET all the tools needed for everyday jobs and is perfect for any non-professional photographer. Its intuitive and simplistic interface make powerful touch-ups a breeze. In fact, I really could not find any real holes in Paint.NET.
I was most impressed by the layers aspect that permits users to put images on top of each other for a polished, professional appearance.
Of course, this is all free for download at their website. You merely need a Windows XP, .NET Framework 2.0 or newer, a 500 MHz processor, 256 MB of RAM, and 200 MB of hard drive space.