They are big, they are loud, the take up a lot of space and they are not portable. Desktop computers were the norm in the early days of computing however, now that laptops have become much more powerful and much more affordable, I believe that desktops are no longer necessary. Why would anyone want to have a computer that just sits and keeps all your data but, can’t go with to work or on a vacation. Although desktops can get better specs for gaming and processor speed but, for the vast majority of users notebooks are more useful because it does not require the purchase of an additional monitor and can take all your data with you anywhere you go. For the past four years, my primary computer has been a notebook and there is nothing my notebooks can’t do that I need.  I recommend people considering buying a desktop to think again before buying that because it could be much more convenient to get a notebook.

Anymore, I do not see the need for having office work done on paper or manually, since the dawn of new, more reliable technologies that can make office life simpler and much more productive. Paper can be damaged, lost, stolen and destroyed, while moving digitally, could prevent the problem of if the office burns down, the business goes with it!  Computers have been more utilized in recent years but I believe that in the future, offices will go completely digital and offices would be completely based on computers.

As an example, I will list the general things that offices need and list their digital replacements:

File Cabinets- Computer hard drives, Web Storage, Internal storage server

Paperless offices are great, despite the fear involved by some people who are computer-phobic might be worried but, as long as data is backed up frequently and off-soite all your data will be safe and much easier to access.

Phones- Skype/VOIP

Skype as I have mentioned before is a much more affordable replacement to landlines and could save offices lots of money and calls can be made anywhere in the world!

Messages/Memos- Email

As for internal company messages just move it all to email, Gmail has a great enterprise solution and could be a great replacement

This is just scratching the surface of the paperless office and although it may be scarry, it is worth it for new companies starting up, along with old companies as a system update for the best.

When the most recent release of Windows, Vista, came out in January 2007 the majority of users were underwhelmed to say the least. Usually in operating systems, new release work better than their predacessor, and have more features. However, Vista caused some users who upgraded greif and sometimes was even less useful than their old operating system was.

Vista’s graphical user interface is a definite upgrade from XP, many believe it was copied off of Mac OS I think it is some what similar to Mac OS, but, I think that it has more if it’s own Windows style as well. Vista also requires more computing power in order to support their new features and a lot of machines that were shipped with Vista were not built to optimal specifications to support Vista well. So even with all this, Vista is still slower than XP. Other problems are security and the problems of functionality.

I believe that Vista was a 5 year project that should never be released and is the next Windows ME, as in an operating system that was a total flop. I reccomend any one getting a new to go with the much more relibable and stable Windows XP. I think however, Windows 7 will be a much better OS and could be a good replacement for XP.

People who know me best know that my favorite beverage in the world is tea. I usually drink about 6 cup each day and all of the tea I buy currently,  is from Adagio.com. Adagio sells a lot of loose leaf tea and some tea that comes in bags too although not as much variety is offered. Adagio has starter kits that allow new customers to sample a variety of teas and provides them with everything they need to make it for around $20.

I began ordering about 6 months ago and have enjoyed it a lot. Adagio offers a wide variety of teas and at very affordable prices. Another great part of adagio’s website is there is a social network aspect that lets you define friends and share your favorite teas with your friends to help suggest teas they might be interested in. Also, if you remain a steady customer you get about 10% of the money you spend back in savings in future purchases which helps keep customers coming back.  You also can review teas that you have purchased in both video and text and Adagio also gives savings for that as well. Adagio also allows their customers to make their own custom blends online and allow others to buy these blends and by doing so raising some money for the creator as well. Here are my custom blends please try them they are very good. I really love Adagio tea and I plan to write reviews of my favorite teas in future blog posts because I really love tea and I love Adagio.

Last week, in the biggest election in the history of the United States, the electoral system was upgraded to much simpler voting machines. These new machines are better for both the voters as well as the voting staff who have to count the votes because the counting is done digitally instead of having to count each ballot individually, these machines can count automatically and save time and struggle.  The other benefit it that by using a computer to count is it eliminates the human errors that occurred in the 2000 election, with the hanging chads on the Florida paper ballots.

I was able to vote for the first time this Election and at my own polling place, the machine was a panel with buttons on for each party  for each office, it also had a straight ticket button to select all the candidates from one party to save time of pushing all those buttons. I believe, that this solution is the best because if the machines move to LCD touch screens, they will be more expensive and have more things that can go wrong with the machines. However, if they do go towards that solution I would recommend that they use a specialized version of Linux that only does what it has to making it more secure and allows it to do what it needs to the best it can and removes functions that are not needed and could compromise the integrity of the vote.

The problem many people have with using digital voting is that if they are based on computer, computers can be hacked and could result in inaccurate results. That is why I believe that by using a limited version of Linux that would only do what it needs to and would be designed to not be hacked. The other issue is people need to be presumed to be technically literate, or to be capable to using these machines successfully. In order to make the transition to these machines fully successful, would require training sessions for people to make sure they know how to operate the machines.

I also think that another idea that could be utilized is voting over the Internet. That would allow people to vote without having to stand in lines and spend time and would result in a better vote turnout because people would have no reason not to vote. This would require use of specialized PIN numbers and a secure website to prevent voting fraud but, I think that would be the best option because then anyone could vote. Even if the people do not have their own Internet access, they could go to a public place with computers available to vote.

Two weeks ago, Internet Television pioneer, Revision3, laid off nine of their workers much to the up roar of their fans.  They also let go of five of their shows, two of which were a syndication of already popular shows.  The reason given for these drastic actions was because there was not enough of an audience for these shows and because of the current economic crisis, money is tight and they wanted to make sure Revision3 could last and continue to produce high quality videos for their fans.

Due to those circumstances, the following shows met their end: Pop Siren, Pixel Perfect, and Internet Superstar, in addition, the two syndicated shows, Epic Fu and Wine Library TV were also removed from the network line-up. In my opinion the cancellation of some of theses shows were warranted, like Internet Superstar which I though had very little value especially after the reformatting. Pop Siren was in it’s earlier days a great show that  thoroughly enjoyed but, when they moved to the 2.0 format it lost it’s value and lost my viewership. Pixel Perfect in my opinion was at the core of what Revision3 was supposed to be, a Internet version of what Tech TV was, which was high quality, technology programming. By cutting Pixel Perfect, Revision3 took one more step closer to becoming another G4. As for the syndicated shows, it was really unwise to begin the syndication in the first place and they put money in it  that they really should have used that money to invest in developing more high quality shows. Gary Vaynerchuk, host of Wine Library TV, even said that he totally agreed with cutting the shows because it was not the right move for Revision3 to spend resources on shows they do not produce.

With all that said, I think that there are still shows on the network that are not worth continuing and should have been canceled instead of Pixel Perfect. The one show I would cancel is The Digg Reel, although it is easy to produce because it is mostly video off of the Digg Video section, mixed with the host commenting on and introducing the videos. That provides very little value to the viewer and really does not deserve to be produced while Pixel Perfect got the axe.

It is unfortunate that these shows had to be canceled and talented people like Sarah Lane and Martin Sargent lost their jobs however. my hope is that Revision3 uses these cancelations as a refresh of the network. I hope they will go back to their roots and go back to informative shows instead of some of the junk they have been producing in recent times.

Unfortunately, all good things must come to an end, and Apple Week is one of those things. I have enjoyed writing about Apple for the past week but, it is time to move on to other topics. However, this will not be the last time I will write about Apple. The reason is as Steve Jobs says “If you want to see the future, look to Apple” I believe that Apple always is doing something interesting and plan to continue to write about it through-out my blogging career. I will definitely keep Apple topics in the mix of all my other articles for the future.

I know this article is short but those are all of the basic reasons on why Mac OS is superior, and the simplicity and saftey make the mac a much better environment. Also, Apple makes a limited number of systems and because of that, there are not nearly as many compatibility as Windows. The only downside of the Mac is the larger price tag, that goes with buying a Mac but, I believe it is totally worth it!

After the latest round of notebook updates, Apple has made the Macbooks a lot more powerful and could be a good option for the majority of people who want a macbook and allows them to save a lot of money. The Macbook Pro has a few advantages but, now that the Macbook has the multi touch interface, alluminum case, and the backlit keyboard which were originally only availible on the Macbook Pro.

The features that are only avalible on the Macbook Pro are the built-in express card slot. This is needed only if you need to add additional USB or Firewire slots with an Express Card or a memory card reader that you would have to buy seperatly.  Another feature is the larger screen Macbooks only come with 13 inch screens but, Macbook Pros boast a 15.4 inch and 17 inch screens so if you need a bigger screen, then you may want to opt for the Macbook Pro. The Macbook Pro also has faster processor options the Macbook can get as powerful as a 2.4 GHZ processor while, the Macbook Pro can go as high as 2.8 GHZ. The Pro also has an extra graphics card that the user can togle to if they want higher performance and want to sacrifice 1 hour of battery life.  Finally, the Pro has a Firewire port which is used many by video producers to capture video from a camera.

The Macbook Pro’s extra features make it $400 more than the high-end Macbook and has a few extra feature and the Macbook would be a great laptop for the average user. However people who might want to consider the pro are people doing high-end video or photo editing or anything graphically demanding the pro is probably the option for them. Also, if you need Firewire or Express Card the Macbook Pro is for you! Otherwise, save your money  and get the macbook!

When I got my Macbook Pro, it was the first time I have used a Mac that was my own, and one that I had an administrator account and full access. I loved all the fun things built into the mac that Windows does not come with and the simplicity and elegance is a major improvement over Windows XP.  When I booted up for the first time, I setup the machine and then logged in I was already ready to use within the first 5 minutes. Another really nice thing, is there is no start menu of applications, instead,  you can either put applications on the dock for quick access or they are in the finder under Applications listed alphabetically. Installing Applications is extremely easy too, all you need top do is download the .dmg and then when you open it drag the Applications Folder and it is installed. Another awesome feature of the mac, is it comes with all the drivers set and the hardware is all setup. One thing that my mac did that was a very nice surprise for me is that it came with a built-in PDF reader and Flash Player which usually has to be installed manually. This is nice because although I could install the applications on my own,  it is much easier to just open the computer and get right to work!

Macs also come with some really cool software out of the box that are great  fun and can be used productivly too. Macs come with imovie, video editing, iWeb for web design, iPhoto, a great photo management applications, ical, and photobooth which take pictres ands has a lot of really cool effects. These are nice not just for casual use but, it can also be used for semi-professionals.

All-in-all with all the great features built-in make it much more apparent why people choose the mac over Windows. With everything built-in it makes it much more easy to just boot up the computer and then get right to the work that you need to get done. The Mac OS has elegance, power and speed making Windows look like a thing of the past. These bonus features built in to the OS, paired with it’s elegance and power makes Mac OS worth the major price difference, I reccomend considering a mac when it is time to buy a new computer.