Windows Shell/User (MSN & OneCare Too) : Opinions

Never again will I buy Movies off the Internet. (Part 2)

ericvogel — Mon, 03 Dec 2007 18:40:00 GMT

I just wanted to post my comment to the person who said I should not have used AOL:

It is not just AOL, it is who ever buys a company who or goes out of business or switch to a new DRM provder. I have issues with my MSN Music WMA-DRM. But obtaining "Free" replacements in same high quality are quick and easy.

Here are some WMA DRM Providers that went down:

- MusicMatch bought by Yahoo! (You must install old MM software to get it to work)
- MSN Music Gone. Lucky if you get it to work.
- URGE by MSN and MTV MSN is now gone and MTV is moving to Real Raphsidy Servce.

So the question is, is DRM a easy viable solution for people who want to be law abiding citizens?

Never again will I buy Movies off the Internet.

ericvogel — Mon, 03 Dec 2007 05:00:41 GMT

I think one I got for free and the other one was cheap. But this goes for the same if you paid full price and use AOL Videos

Dear Eric,
Thank you for being a customer of the AOL® Video store. We have an exciting update for you on our service: to continue to bring you an industry-leading purchase experience, we have partnered with Amazon.com®. Going forward, Amazon.com® will power our video download service.
What does this mean for you?

Videos you have already purchased from the AOL Video Store will stay on your computer, and continue to work on that computer as long as you want them.
If you don't already have the version for use on portable devices, please download any you need today by going here. The portable device versions won't be available for download after December 31, 2007.
If you want to transfer your video to any other computers, please do so today. You will not be able to move your video to other computers after December 31, 2007.
Through the Amazon.com® service, we are able to offer you even more titles for purchase and download, and more options, such as video rentals

We are substantially changing our service, so please note:

Going forward, to find the videos you already purchased, use these step-by-step instructions:

Go to "My Documents" and click on "My Videos"
Click on "AOL Video"
The files ending in ".wmv" are your videos. Double click on the icons to watch your video anytime. If you need help, click here.

We hope you will continue to enjoy all AOL Video has to offer.
Thank you!
The AOL Video team
Amazon and Amazon.com are registered trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc. or its affiliates. AOL is a registered trademark of AOL LLC.

Ok, my PC crashes or I buy a new one. I will lose them forever. I assure you AOL and Amazon I will NEVER buy DRM content from you again!! Once again another service treats people who LEGALLY purchase their content like crap. Of course it would be two expensive to leave a few servers up to allow authentication and de-activation and re-activation of DRM Movies? I think not. These are greedy companies. Heck, why doesn't Amazon take it over and AOL transfer their certificates and keys over. That's right, it costs time and money. It is their problem and they make it mine. Now only if there were a way I could illegally remove my DRM protection on my WMV files I LEGALLY own to keep for ever. Another idea, allow us to remove the DRM legally from our purchased files.

I just thought of something! I am gonna write a complaint letter to the Attorney general!

ViewPoint Media Player now does shady spyware tatics.

ericvogel — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 13:31:00 GMT

I was reading the Great Lakes I.T. Report and saw a local company is doing a street level 3D map of Makinaw Island (Michigan) I installed ViewPoint to see it. This morning I un-locked my computer and saw a update for it. I did not read the update box, and trusted it. Sure enough it installed their toolbar which causes IE to crash everytime it closes, and when open suck the resources out of my PC. I went to end task IExplorer.exe cause it did not respond to the red X and it was using 128 megs or ram. I did remove the toolbar, but I wonder whatever spyware junk it would have installed later on along killing this PC, which has limited resources to begin with. (P-IV 2.8Ghz (Pentium D), 1 gig ram.) I highly suggest that no one every install their software again. Even if they do not install spyware now, they cannot be trusted now. Once someone goes shady / grey area, whats to stop them? Also note, AOL Client software installs their software so be sure to remove it after you install AOL 9.0.

BetaNews | TiVo Fast Forward Popup Ads Return

ericvogel — Wed, 17 Jan 2007 13:52:01 GMT

Customers of the DVR service TiVo began reporting over the weekend that the fast forward ads which appear during commercial breaks have reappeared. The ads appeared last in March 2005, when the company was testing new ways to generate money from the service.

Source: BetaNews | TiVo Fast Forward Popup Ads Return

Ok, so people pay for the box most times, and pay for the service, and now they want to show ads to paying customers? If any DVR did that I paid for I would cancel my service and go with Windows Media Center or another software PVR.

Ben's Space: MySpace Viruses and How to Prevent Against Them (and Other Viruses)

ericvogel — Thu, 28 Dec 2006 13:56:30 GMT

More reasons to be careful on MySpace and other websites.

To Whom This May Concern:
The MySpace website (http://www.myspace.com) is filled with thousands of viruses. Many of the viruses steal people's passwords to post advertisements on their bulletins, wasting system resources, bandwidth, and disk space. Other viruses are not meant to advertise, but rather to harm ones system by deleting files, stealing credit card information, and doing so much as deleting ones system.

Source: Ben's Space: MySpace Viruses and How to Prevent Against Them (and Other Viruses)

Review: Toshiba GigaBeat S

ericvogel — Wed, 13 Dec 2006 05:46:00 GMT

I will be posting (Check back for updates) what I like and my dislikes here about this product:

Likes:

Pretty smooth interface, and is similar to Media Center ineterface.

Dislikes

Let the device sit for a few days, plugged in headphones device locked up, needed reboot and battery was low. Rebooted, not enough juice to use. Also, seemed to charge quickly, not sure if this is normal or the power meter reader is off.
Tends to crash frequently
I found 2 Christmas CD's that were not ripped, so I ripped them and added them to the "Christmas" playlist. The albums went over fine, but the Christmas playlist only had the 2 new albums and lost all the the others. The laptop (Vista RC2, WMP11) has all the songs in the play list.
No touchpad
Too many buttons
When you turn off the device while listening to a song, when turning on song does not start so you have to hit play.
No way to see if there really is a firmware update. What do I do? Plug it in and run Windows Update?
Manual was not printed.
Lack of Codec support like Divx. (Hey, I am gonna rip movie DVD'ss and Simpson Episodes. (Since this Summer, I now am collecting all the seasons of The Simpsons. I will pay no more than $20 for a season, makes it slower to collect them, but I am working on one box and have 3 more to do. (Target has Season One for $20. I got the Maggie one for $20 too which was the latest one till tomorrow a new one comes out.))
No Podcasting
No DVD Ripper to device.(There are people like me who legally obtain music and movies.)

Microsoft admits WGA failures “coming up more commonly now”

ericvogel — Fri, 29 Sep 2006 16:30:00 GMT

Here is some more info about WGA issues for valid legal customers:
http://blogs.zdnet.com/Bott/?p=142&tag=nl.e540

Susan Bradley states Microsoft snuck us a WGA update without stating so or the changes:
http://msmvps.com/blogs/bradley/archive/2006/09/27/Communication-101.aspx

Adware Offers Bogus Security Apps

ericvogel — Fri, 21 Jul 2006 18:01:00 GMT

Newly discovered adware in the wild tries to dupe users into installing fake security applications. According to Panda Software's PandaLabs, the adware program, ProtectionBar, warns users that their computers are infected with malware, and they must purchase a license for the "security app" to remove the bad code... http://www.darkreading.com/document.asp?doc_id=99483

Always best to stick with a known good program like: Microsoft Windows Defender www.microsoft.com/spywarewww.microsoft.com/spyware (Free) Ad-Aware www.lavasoftusa.comwww.lavasoftusa.com (Free & Paid) Spybot www.safer-networking.orgwww.safer-networking.org (Free (Donations Accepted)) Spy Sweeper www.webroot.comwww.webroot.com (Paid. Can get good deal at Costco or free with MSN Premium & Dial-up, or cheap or free with promo sales.)

These are the main ones I have used, and most used by the public when giving support online or offilne. (I have not tried Spy Sweeper. )

Other security companies make them too and/or include them in their ANti-Virus products. Symantec (Norton) came in the market 2 years late and am not sure if I trust them enough yet. Work Computers run Symantec Anti-virus 10.1 and Windows Defender. Panda, McAfee, CA and TrendMicro also sell them.

Microsoft Installs new Coffee Machines in break rooms.

ericvogel — Tue, 06 Jun 2006 19:35:25 GMT

I would love to own one in my house and in my office. The thing grind the beans too. Another Picture: http://www.flickr.com/photos/35034363287@N01/158160261/ Sources: http://scobleizer.wordpress.com/2006/06/02/back-at-microsoft-drinking-the-starbucks/ http://blog.seattlepi.nwsource.com/microsoft/archives/103987.asp

The State of Parental Controls and Instant Messaging.

ericvogel — Thu, 16 Mar 2006 23:42:00 GMT

I was given the task to bolt down the boss's son's new computer I had pushed and pushed to get so he can do normal teen things. I thought this was going to be easy. But, I thought I would share my experience and a hole I found in doing so. The two programs I found that were from reputable companies and got good marks was NetNanny and k9 Web Protection. NetNanny seemed to be the best to cover almost everything. I had read some people were complaining it would crash and hose some peoples computers. Also seems it has not been updated in a few years and the website had a non-professional feel to it. I have found work arounds for it and the only way NetNanny can stop it is to block thoughs sites. But there are ways to get the files from a a friends computer. Someone suggested k9 which is made by Blue Coat. Blue Coat makes appliances / software to monitor content on corporate systems. They wanted to give back to the community, so they created k9 and give it out free to home users for home use only. I was not able to find a way to by-pass it and I did kill the service it runs and I was no longer able to connect to the Internet. I like the highly configurablity of it. The only down side is it puts MP3/Streaming Music/P2P (Peer 2 Peer) in one category. I would like P2P to have its own. I do not think most people would mind if a teen buys music legally with his money or listen to a radio stream that their parents pay for like MSN Radio Plus.

I can turn on and off access to Instant Messaging (IM) programs, but there is no way for these programs to disable and lock down these apps. I am writing this in hopes that IM companies such as AOL, MSN, Yahoo! and Google build in parental controls like allow for a parent to approve contacts, turn off web cam, audio conversations and file transfer. Window Live Messenger 8, which is in beta right now, has Shared Folders. This is great for sharing files with friends and family. But if you lock down your kids computer, a friend can just drop any size file in your kids shared folder and it will be transfered over. Same with file transfer but that is one file by one file. I think the IM companies should take matters into their own hands and include parental controls in their products. Some do have them, but you have to subscribe to their Internet service BUT they do not offer protection on their competitors. I have to use 2 IM clients to serve who I IM. I would prefer one, but that is life. Teens may use 3 or more. I would also like to see stealth IM monitoring. I know I maybe hard on some of these, but with the child predator's out there every parent needs to know what their kid(s) are up to and make sure they are not getting into trouble or talking to a 13 year old who is really 35 with a evil plot. Please, lets keep our kids and teens safe!

Also, MySpace is not the best for teens, but I am on the teens side why they want it. I suggest parents secretly monitor their kids or better yet make them do it with you over their shoulder. One thing they may not find harmful is this. A 14 year old, really good looking posts their picture, puts on the website which school they go to and blogs about a game at a certain time and date. This gives people too much info. I took this example from Good Morning America which had 3 daughters and their Mom's on. I had to leave for work, so I did not get if something happened or not. (lets hope not.) MySpace allows you to put in a full name but does not show the last name. Do a search with the full name and you might find your teen. You can also do a search for all teens in your area. Do not search by age because COPA says no one under 14 without parent consent. So your kid might lie about their age so they can open an account.

The other suggestion I keep hearing, put the computer in the family room where the family is most times and never in the kids bedroom.

Windows Live Toolbar release imminent

ericvogel — Wed, 08 Mar 2006 13:57:00 GMT

http://www.liveside.net/comments.php?shownews=108

Announcing the All New Live Favorites!

ericvogel — Wed, 08 Mar 2006 13:54:00 GMT

What we've done:

Redesigned Look & Feel - A much cleaner interface, easier to manage
Full Screen Experience - No longer do you have to manage your favorites in one small area of the screen
In-Line Preview - Preview your favorite web pages from within Live Favorites
Browse by Tags - Not just for search, you can now see a list of your tags and browse by them
Right-Click Enabled - Right-click any favorite to edit it's properties
Real-Time Search - Start typing a search and have your bookmarks filtered on the fly!

http://spaces.msn.com/livefavorites/Blog/cns!588B7D8358652DA8!253.entry

Windows Live Clipboard: Wiring the web

ericvogel — Wed, 08 Mar 2006 13:53:00 GMT

http://www.liveside.net/comments.php?shownews=106

live.com refresh!

ericvogel — Wed, 08 Mar 2006 13:51:00 GMT

http://spaces.msn.com/livecom/Blog/cns!D4909E7F27E254E9!750.entry

- The new and improved first run experience

o        best place to search using the new Windows Live Search
o        best place to grasp Windows Live as a whole
o        a great customizable homepage with the user at the center of their experience

- Improved user experience and features

o        You’ll notice our hot new themes!
o        Integrated experience for adding and managing your stuff (feeds and gadgets), drag and drop items right from that area on to your page
o        The much improved RSS reading experience
o        The much improved experience for ‘my stuff’ – try importing your OPML file!
o        Pages!!

§         Yes, now you can have multiple pages for all the gadgets and feeds you want to you
§         Double click to rename your page
§         Drag your pages to re-order them

o        Search for feeds using the new Windows Live Search and add them to live right from search
o        Like a search query, save your search by adding it to live.com using a mini-search gadget
o        Find feeds using the new Windows Live toolbar and add them to live.com right from the toolbar

- What you can’t see

We have done a tremendous amount on our infrastructure; live.com was built on our start.com incubation infrastructure…. With this launch we’ve deployed a scaleable, geofederatable, higher performance backend which we’re looking forward to growing in to

- New gadgets

o        Image search – search for images right on live.com and enjoy a little slide show of your images powered by the hot new Windows Live search
o        Windows Live gallery – view all windows live services and add their gadgets if there is one available
o        Gadget gallery – the latest and greatest gadgets from microsoftgadgets.com, add the gadget you like to live.com with one click
o        Weather – gorgeous icons, drag and drop of cities and see the current conditions for your default city when collapsed!
o        Stocks – drag and drop of stocks, collapsed form now shows your stocks in ticker form and chart integration
o        Clock – track the time in multiple cities, we even have a nice effect for sunrise and sunset!, collapse it to see the time for your default
o        MSN Video – search for any video you like, or browser across categories and watch them inline right on live.com

India Call Center Math / A little in-sight.

ericvogel — Thu, 02 Mar 2006 15:01:00 GMT

I was watching Good Morning America and found this interesting. To help the cope with us American's since we tend to get mad at them more than a American call center. 35=10. A 35 year old has the brain of a 10 year old. Does this mean if us, as Americans just get angry, or does it apply if I call in, and instead of saying, go to the control panel, they slowly walk me through it? Also, they said American's do get upset with them and sometimes they haver to put them on hold to take a rest and do cuss back (while customers are on hold). Please do remember, even though you might not like out sourcing, these are human beings and deserve the same respect as you would. If you do not like out-sourcing, please vote with your wallet when you buy products and/or services. Also, one word for them and this has only happened once to me. Please do not get mad at me if I keep asking you to repeat yourself because I cannot understand you because of your heavy accent.

I.T. (Information Technology) jobs went up 17 percent. Companies have focused more on other areas. Also too, India was close to nuclear war with Pakistan and it was not the government. It was G.E. saying we cannot have your works off, not even for a week, so Delhi got it and no war. Now they are saying we will start speaking with people in Bulgaria and other small countries. I do not know what exactly to believe because there will always be a study out for either point-of-view and I did hear though that I.T. jobs are increasing.

Indian's make $2 hour. But it seems they can live with this. Also there are tutors over there that help our kids over here via the Internet. The kid said she was nice and they found her and she is. If the kid has issues she would play a game with him, then come back. Now the kid cannot wait to get his homework done and join his friends. And where does she live? With her parents. Their kids are 3 grade levels above us.

NVIDIA Accused of hiring actors to post on forums

ericvogel — Wed, 08 Feb 2006 14:24:00 GMT

http://www.neowin.net/index.php?act=view&id=32269

MS Forms New Internet Research Arm

ericvogel — Fri, 27 Jan 2006 14:00:00 GMT

http://www.betanews.com/article/MS_Forms_New_Internet_Research_Arm/1138295687

MSN Admits to Sharing Search Data

ericvogel — Tue, 24 Jan 2006 13:44:00 GMT

http://www.betanews.com/article/MSN_Admits_to_Sharing_Search_Data/1138040445

I wish the other search companies like Google would stand up to the DOJ. This is not too prying now, but how far will it be pushed next time?

Leak of Windows Live Messenger 8

ericvogel — Mon, 07 Nov 2005 16:30:00 GMT

As you may know the dogfood version of Windows Live Messenger (WLM) 8 is floating around the net. This version is for internal testing for Microsoft employees. (dogfood means the company beta tests their own product before releasing it to Microsoft / MSN's beta testers.) You cannot login to WLM, unless you have a passport (www.passport.com) account that is set by Microsoft / MSN as a WLM 8 beta account.

There are programs out there to work around this, but there are known reports that some have viruses in them. I suggest waiting till the official beta starts. This way you get a more stable version, and not be possibly infected with viruses, Trojans and such.

I know a lot of you, like me are anxious to start testing WLM8, but I for one am waiting to be invited into the beta.

The first people to test it will be (us,) the MSN Beta Butterflies. We will then be able to invite our friends so we can test WLM 8 with out friends. Then more invites to follow. This info was pulled from: http://spaces.msn.com/members/MessengerSays/Blog/cns!1pa8Iikfy0xU3xf4W911Jq4Q!323.entry

MSN Releases new Live! Service's

ericvogel — Tue, 01 Nov 2005 23:47:00 GMT

Mail Beta (Kahuna) is now Windows Mail Live! Start is not Live!. MSN Messenger is now Windows Live Messenger.

Microsoft is now merging their MSN line into Windows.
http://ideas.live.com/

I do not know if this is good or not, but I hope they do not change the MSN Beta Team / structure.