This move confirms the, well, whipsers that the Whisper Systems deal was mostly made for acqui-hire purposes. It should also assuage some worries that Whisper Systems’ technology, which was built largely to help protect activists’ mobile phone calls and messages from being intercepted by governments, would be ignored or snuffed out completely post-deal.

The open source roll-out began on Tuesday with the release of Whisper Systems’ TextSecure software, which provides support for encrypted texts on Android devices. Twitter says that eventually all of Whisper Systems code will be made available as open source software, but the process will occur gradually. A blog post announcing the plan reads in part:

“If you follow what’s going on at Twitter, you hopefully know we are heavy consumers and producers of open source technology (@TwitterOSS); we love the stuff! That said, we also believe that open source is not something to do on a whim.

Before we fully release Whisper Systems’ code to the public in the coming months, we need to make sure it meets legal requirements and is consumable by the open source community. The plan is to open source the code in an iterative fashion… We look forward to seeing what the community builds around the Whisper Systems open source contribution.”

Whisper Systems’ two person team, Moxie Marlinspike and Stuart Anderson, both joined Twitter’s full-time workforce as part of the acquisition and remain at the company today. No word on what exactly they’ll be working on going forward, but with more than 250 million Tweets going through Twitter’s system every day and much of the company’s growth coming from mobile users, there is surely no shortage of projects there that could use the full attention of such mobile software security experts.

Open sign photo courtesy of Flickr user loop_oh

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Step 1: Get Spotify

There are two ways to get a Spotify account: either by invitation for a free account, or by paying for premium or unlimited accounts. Once you have an account set up, you’ll need to download and install the Spotify OS X client application. Then just start browsing for music and create playlists. Just a few more steps, and you’ll turn your house into one big Spotify jukebox.

Step 2: Extend AirPlay to any Mac music app with Airfoil

Next you’ll need Rogue Amoeba’s Airfoil for Mac. Airfoil has been around since long before Apple introduced AirPlay and the second generation Apple TV. Any audio application on the Mac (including Spotify), or even the Mac’s system output can be made accessible to AirPlay devices with Airfoil.

1. Download and install Rogue Amoeba’s Airfoil for Mac.
2. Choose Spotify in Airfoil as the application you want to play.
3. Choose the AirPlay and/or Airfoil device(s) you want to connect to.
4. Play music using Spotify.

Step 3: Extend your range with Airfoil speakers

One of the limitations of Apple’s AirPlay has been the fact that iOS devices themselves are not able to receive AirPlay streams, only send them. Luckily, Rogue Amoeba created an app called Airfoil Speakers Touch for iOS devices that allows Airfoil to play music on any and all iOS devices connected to your local network. This works great if you want to extend your playback to speakers that otherwise would not be connected. There’s also a version of Speakers for OS X (.zip file) that will allow you to extend your playback to all the Macs on your network. Keep in mind that you are limited to your local network, so this is not a workaround for taking your library on the go, which is only included in the premium and unlimited Spotify accounts.

Bonus: Remote control options to round it all off

Now that you’re playing music from Spotify around your house, how can you also control it remotely? There are two good third-party solutions to help with this: One will let you control Airfoil on your Mac, and the other will allow you to control Spotify.

• Reemote for Airfoil. Kai Aras’ Reemote lets turn on and off different combinations of Airfoil and AirPlay enabled devices on your network. You can even control their individual volumes, to some extent, and you can switch your audio source application on the host Mac. There is an iPhone as well as an iPad version of Reemote. To make this work, you’ll also need to download and install the Reemote Server application for Mac.
• Two Remotes for Spotify. To control what playlists you’re listening to from within Spotify on the Mac, there are two good solutions. Axel Moller’s Spot Remote and Anders O’s Remoteless. Both apps are universal, supporting both the iPhone and iPad. Both allow you to browse and start Spotify playlists, as well as search for tracks, artist and albums. Another thing they both share is the use of an open source library called SIMBL. The server software for Spot Remote as well as Remoteless requires that SIMBL be installed on the host Mac in order for either solution to work. SIMBL allows third-party developers to enhance the functionality of other applications from other developers. Unfortunately, while it seems to work for some, OS X Lion does not yet appear to be officially supported by either solution.

Since this does require a bit of setup, it isn’t quite as easy as just using iTunes and an Apple TV. But if you’re looking for an alternative that makes use of Spotify’s great new service, maybe this is the whole home music solution you’ve been waiting for.

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Year-old Geostellar pulls together at least 25 different types of data into its platform, including information about weather, shadows, roof slope, closest transmission lines, property values, land use, electricity rates, solar subsidies, and solar hazards. In addition, the company is constantly adding in more data sets like information about brownfields — a sudden hot area for solar installers — and data from pertinent recent legislation explained Geostellar CEO David Levine in an interview with me this week.

All that data goes into a system solar installers and utilities can use to search for useful data to target solar customers. For example, a solar installer could search Geostellar’s system for the locations of rooftops of a certain size in New Jersey or California and hone a mailing list down to the best potential candidates. The system can also estimate the amount of solar power, in kilowatt-hours/per year, that any rooftop would be able to produce if it had panels on it.

The solar rooftop companies are all fighting over a few select markets right now — California, New Jersey and Massachusetts — noted Levine, and Geostellar’s platform can help increase their sales. The company sells access to the software via a monthly license and then also charges the users for the data, depending on how extensive it is. So far pilot customers include CleanPath Renewables, Community Energy and AES Solar in Northern Virginia.

Eventually Geostellar will offer a consumer facing site, so interested solar buyers can search their own home — or their neighbors — to see how solar-friendly it is. RoofRay is offering a similar idea. Levine said Geostellar wanted to launch the industry section first to grow its revenues, before it launched a consumer site, which would likely be free to access.

Geostellar, based in West Virginia, has raised million from a group of angel investors including Flash Forward Ventures, and the company plans to start raising a Series B round after it has closed a couple more customer deals.

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If a computer has what we call hardware and software, same goes with your car. In cars, the external parts would be the hardware part while the parts that concerning engine or the car’s system, they can be considered as the software. Any car owner should definitely make it a point to get to know the parts of his car. It is a basic knowledge. When you’re told to get to know your car, you don’t have to push yourself hard and get to know its inner parts, its engine and its systems to be specific. But if you are really interested, why not? Just make sure that when you do start studying your car, you are being assisted by someone who really have the knowledge about technical stuffs.

Needless to say, part have many parts. Just knowing the body and the exterior parts would be enough. As said, you don’t need to know basically everything not unless you are really into it. car panels, grilles and bumpers are just some of the car parts that you need to know. Car panels come in different types and have different purposes as well. For example, a car has a part called rocker panel which in between the two wheel wells. There’s also a quarter panel, it covers the part between the rear door and the trunk. Grilles are usually placed at the front of vehicles. They are the ones protecting the radiator and the engine. Air passes through them, neutralizing the temperature of a car inside. Car bumpers are placed in the car’s front-most and rear-most parts. They have been placed there so to minimize the impact of a collision so that the engine won’t be affected.

There are other important car parts but they have not been mentioned although they do matter just as well. External parts are the parts of the car we usually see and touch first before we can even get inside a car. And since we always see them, memorizing them won’t be hard at all. So make it a point to get to know your car and its parts and you can get the most out of it. Remember, your car is like your journey partner. So it just makes sense if you know how to take care of it and the important details about it. Knowing the parts of your cars is just the beginning.

Inside it is a powerful processor that makes the machine capable of dishing out 4 color pages a minute and 17 black-and-white pages a minute with CLP 315 compatible toner. With the impressively fast first page out time, more tasks can be finished: 26 seconds for color and 13 seconds for black-and-white. However, both the printing and first page out speeds are also affected by certain factors including the complexity of the document or the configuration of the computer’s system.

Less than 45 DBA of noise is emitted by this black beauty thanks to Samsung’s NO NOISE print engine. This means your home or workplace can be kept free of distraction as you come up with your documents – no matter how busy the environment gets. NO NOISE print engine is also used on the company’s other best-selling high-end printers.

Supported media types include bond, regular paper, recycled, glossy, cards, transparencies, labels and envelopes. Compatible media sizes range from as little as 3.0″ x 6.3″ to as big as 8.5″ x 14.0″. This black beauty comes fitted with a 150-sheet input media tray which may be detached. But there are no expansion slots around, so neither the input nor the output media capacity of the machine can be increased.

Documents can have resolutions of as much as 2400 x 600 dots per inch. It’s very simple to replace the cartridges should they run out of toner, thanks to the innovative layout. Now, there’s no need to slow down whenever these consumables are being replaced. Speaking of toners, colors included are black, yellow, cyan and magenta – each one can yield 1500 pages.

There’s a hi-speed USB cable around that simplifies connection of this stunner to a computer. Installation shouldn’t give you a headache as it’s compatible with several different operating systems. Manual duplex and driver support is included so it’s possible to come up with two-sided printouts. Printer language emulation used is SPL-C.

Compared to rivals, this is definitely more compact as its body measures 15.3″ (width) x 12.3″ (height) x 9.6″ (depth). It only weighs 24.3 lb. With this size and weight, taking it from one place to another, depending where its service is needed, is trouble-free. You may place it right on your desk, and still have plenty of room for your other things. The stylish black design is also sure to grab everyone’s attention.

The Samsung CLP 315 printer toner cartridges printer is a personal type of laser printing machine. Although it comes with basic features and simple operation with CLP 315 compatible toner, its performance is definitely something not to overlook. It’s capable of churning out your color or monochrome documents quickly and with impressive quality with CLP 315 compatible toner. It’s also ENERGY STAR qualified, so you know you can meet your monthly budget.

Well, look what we’ve got here! Seeing that HTC just introduced the Incredible S — a world phone only available in the UK — it was only a matter of time before the phone hit the stateside. A trusted tipster just hit us with screen shots of Verizon’s internals containing a device dubbed HTC ADR6350. The other screenshot below has a listing for the HTC63503 with a description of “INCRD2.” Putting two and two together, we’d say with great confidence that the Incredible 2 is coming to Verizon in the near future — and we certainly wouldn’t be surprised if it had something to do with that “buttonless” shot we saw a while back. Stay tuned as we try and dig up more details… and in the meantime, peep the second screenshot after the break!

Continue reading HTC Droid Incredible 2 shows up in Verizon’s system

HTC Droid Incredible 2 shows up in Verizon’s system originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 26 Feb 2011 05:01:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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If you hate doing math and you run a small business then surely you’ve looked longingly at mobile credit card systems like Square’s longingly. No handling of cash certainly would make life easier, but Square’s system of fees and surcharges weren’t exactly easy to figure out themselves. Now the company has simplified things, dropping the $.15 per-transaction fee for swiped purchases, charging a simple 2.75 percent on each transaction. If, however, that transaction is being made without swiping the actual card the $.15 transaction fee sadly comes back, but the percentage fee has gone down from 4.0 percent to 3.5. So, a little less of your handiwork will be absorbed by the man.

[Thanks, Brent]

Square mobile payment system gets simpler pricing, keeps angular shape originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 23 Feb 2011 09:58:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Google has gotten a lot of attention for the launch of One Pass, the all-in-one subscription plan for publishers that the search giant revealed earlier today — primarily because it made for a nice counterpoint to Apple’s new in-app subscription system, which launched on Tuesday. While Apple’s offering is closed and takes a big chunk of the revenue from publishers, Google’s takes a much smaller cut — and because it is based on the web and not on controlling access to a walled garden, Google’s system is much more open. That said, however, it’s not at all clear that publishers are going to get anywhere by signing up for it, open or not.

The main benefits of Google’s plan are fairly obvious: it doesn’t force publishers to provide the company with preferential access to their customers, the way Apple does by requiring in-app purchasing for all subscription services, and Google is only taking 10 percent of the revenue that any publishers bring in via its payment system, while Apple takes 30 percent of all subscription fees. On top of that, as MG Siegler notes, the One Pass system provides publishers with access to information about those who sign up — names, email addresses, zip codes and so on — which is crucial data that content companies use to market their services to advertisers. Apple turns this option off by default, and users have to opt in.

That’s the good news. And the bad news? The bad news is that Google’s One Pass is pretty much just a warmed-over content paywall. All it does is collect the money for publishers who want to try and put up a toll-booth around their content. In fact, the thing that it resembles the most — as Josh Benton of the Nieman Journalism Lab notes — is the Journalism Online Press+ system that entrepreneur Steven Brill and former Wall Street Journal executive Gordon Crovitz have been peddling to newspapers and magazines for the past year or more, without much success.

Like that system, Google’s service is essentially designed to handle the payment processing for multiple subscription sites, so that users can theoretically sign up for dozens of them and not have to worry about being nickel and dimed by each one. There’s just one problem: there’s no sign that users have any interest in doing this — or at least, not in large enough numbers to make it work for anyone other than perhaps The Economist and the Wall Street Journal. Those who have put up new paywalls, including The Times of London, have seen the vast majority of their readers disappear into the wind.

One of the reasons why users of Apple products like the iPhone and the iPad seem a lot more willing to pay for things like apps is because the experience is so much better and paying is so easy. But despite that, magazine and newspaper publishers have have had little success so far in getting people to pay for their apps. Why would it be any easier with Google’s One Pass? If anything, it’s likely to be even harder, because it’s based on the open web — and users are likely to notice that all around them is free content, while iPhone and iPad apps do a fairly good job of disguising that fact.

So congratulations to Google for making some hay with its launch, but any publisher who sees One Pass as some kind of golden ticket is dreaming in technicolor.

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There are times when we think that something affected our computer when it experiences unusual activities like hanging. Once in a while we see apps activate without our knowledge. We do not pay attention to these signs. Once in a while these glitches happen but it can be a sign that we have more serious computer problem.

It is kind of a bad omen when we see windows error code. You can search online about the error codes than learn how to fix it.

Even if we have a lot of error codes in front of us, we must consider other factors as well. All these errors must be a sign that malicious software may have gotten inside our system.

With that, we need to find a solution in determining what adware, spyware, and other malicious entries entered our computer’s system and a solution on how to block adware and spyware, and these other malicious entries.

We can easily search the Internet for solutions on how to block adware and spyware. The solutions we find on the net may not be all that effective. When it comes to security programs, we need to be very meticulous. As I said before, you need to know the root cause. It might be because of different downloads that we do in sites that are either untrustworthy or with expired certificates or licenses, or sites that are quite dubious.

When we know the bug in our system, we can now get effective spyware removal software. There are cleaners that can fix some malware but not others. You need to be very meticulous about the software you download because it can also be infected with adware. It is true that some programs disguise themselves as legitimate antispyware, but they can’t help remove spyware from your system at all.

So what My Security Wall will do to your computer ? This rogue program was first seen over the net in February 2010. Like the others rogue programs part of the previously mentioned category, it will behave as a real antivirus program once on your computer system. Once it has infected your PC, this malware will do a fake system scan for viruses and such. This is but a false scan.This website Remote Computer Repair is an online service dedicated to delete viruses like this one.

During that fake scan, this rogue program will delete good files that are being used by your OS and it will create new ones that can be grouped into 2 different categories: the first group are those of useless and harmless files. Second group are files that are helping this spyware to function. This rogue program will show you a long list of Trojans, viruses and more that it did find on your system. In reality, the files mentioned in the list are either healthy files from the PC or infected files that were created by the application itself.

After creating those files, My Security Wall will further damage your PC the following way: the phase two begins where you should observe a constant display of pop ups and ads and the misleading from the web pages you want to visit to other websites.

As you can see, My Security Wall is no more than a program that hijacks your PC and slows down its performance. Two main choices are then available to you: the first choice is a manual removal. The second choice is an automatic removal done by appropriate software that you should use the moment you’re aware of the previously described symptoms.