Cool Stuff

I have a real soft sport for Brookstone – whenever I’m in the US, I have to sneak in to see the latest in Slanket technology, and find out what new household objects the company can apply a layer to Tempur to. I go in with a smile, and never fail to come out without buying something. I’m next…

Delve into the Windows 7 Personalization Gallery and you’ll find a fantastic array of sidebar gadgets that will brighten up your desktop and make it a whole lot more useful. Falling into the former category, if not the latter, is the Xbox 360 Avatar Sidebar Gadget. Spotted by Windows Observer this…

Whilst I’m pretty sure that most of you that hang out at Channel 9 are wise enough to install anti-malware protection on your computers, there are hundreds of thousands, if not millions of PCs out there that remain unprotected – many of them in small businesses. PCs taken out by viruses not only…

October is the spookiest month of the year, fact. As the warmth of the season of mists and mellow fruitfulnesss is grasped by the ice-cold fingers of winter, the days become shorter, the nights longer and the earth spins slowly into the “dark half” of the year. That’s according to the Celts, who…

Mashable are reporting today that the Wi-Fi Alliance are set to announce a new standard enabling intra-device communications, without the need for an wireless network. Wi-Fi Direct will allow devices to share, show, print and play content from one device to another, enabling your digital…

In another great example of Microsoft tying its different services together, Windows Live Hotmail now integrates with Bing Maps. According to the Bing team, when you create a new email, one of the new options on the Insert Menu in Hotmail is “From Bing.” It sits to the right of the standard…

Although I don’t personally recommend this, there are some people out there who don’t want to bother with using a password to protect their Windows user account. Of course, using a password in Windows isn’t required, only suggested. But even if you don’t fill one in, you still have to click your…

Ford, the auto manufacturer whose vehicles include Microsoft’s SYNC technology, is offering two new features that aim to address the problem of distracted driving. First up: a do-not-disturb button that will block incoming text messages and phone calls from the paired Bluetooth phone, but will…

Mike Ormonod recently created a Windows Phone 7 application called Vuvuzela, which everyone knows by now to be the obnoxious but fun South African horns that made the rounds at this year’s World Cup. Although the World Cup has come to an end and the Vuvuzela madness may soon be forgotten, the…

Yesterday, Microsoft announced a partnership with blog specialist Automattic that will see 30 million Windows Live Spaces users upgraded and transitioned over to Wordpress.com accounts. The move doubles the size of the Wordpress.com user base which is now one of the largest free blogging platforms…