Alan Buckingham

Google Play Music launched last year, beginning its life known simply as Google Music, growing up quickly since its humble private beta beginning. The app and web service officially launched in late 2011 and have grown quickly since then. Now the latest update has just been pushed out today to Google Play. The search giant also recently announced availability of the store and also Nexus devices in Europe and Australia as well as in the United States directly from Google and T-Mobile.

First, as for the brand new Play Music update, Google has added several features that should enhance the user experience. The update rolled out quietly without any official press release or even a post to their Android blog where these announcements frequently appear. So what is new in version 4.4.811H you ask?

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Microsoft has certainly been busy on both the consumer and enterprise sides of its business. Consumers now have access to Windows 8 and Surface tablets, while IT folks are still digesting all of the news from the recent Build Conference. The company, however, continues to press forward and today it kicked off yet another IT-centric show -- this time it's the SharePoint 2012 Conference, which is underway in Las Vegas.

Ironically, despite the "2012" part of the name, the conference actually surrounds SharePoint 2013. Microsoft claims this latest version will add significant improvements to "social, cloud and mobile capabilities". Those are some big claims, so what are we truly looking at here?

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It would be an understatement to call the past year a wild ride for Kim Dotcom, founder of MegaUpload, but the New Zealand entrepreneur has not slowed down. Dotcom is preparing his latest website, MEGA, after losing control of his former site. He originally secured the me.ga URL using the Gabon top level domain, but then lost it recently when the Gabon government announced they would not host the new site. Still undeterred, Dotcom has taken to Twitter to blame the United States government for pressuring Gabon. He also talked there of plans to continue to pursue his new website.

Earlier today, Dotcom once again logged into his Twitter account, this time to announce that MEGA has found a new home -- "New Zealand will be the home of our new website: http://Mega.co.nz  - Powered by legality and protected by the law."

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First Amazon and now Google. The holidays begin earlier every year. Amazon got things kicked off by first rolling out the traditional Black Friday Store and then, more recently, the new Santa App. Now Google has decided to step into the fray with its own holiday season release to aid customers in lightening their wallets.

Today Google rolled out version 3.0 of its Shopper app for Android and iOS devices and packs some enhancements to get you through your holiday season shopping and relieve you of a bit of money, albeit at a discount mind you.

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Can't wait for Windows Phone 8? Maybe you are hoping to score one of those recently-announced Nokia phones like the Lumia 920 and 820 on AT&T, or the Lumia 822 on Verizon? Are you waiting for that free wireless charger?

Well, we have some good news and some bad news.

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The kids grow up so fast, don't they?

It seems like only yesterday I began using Firefox, but Mozilla has reminded us that today is the eighth birthday of its Firefox browser. Those eight years, while seeming to have flown by, have had their smooth parts as well as their bumpy. The story of the "little browser that could" all began on November 9th 2004.

"The Mozilla Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to preserving choice and promoting innovation on the Internet, today announced the worldwide availability of the Mozilla Firefox 1.0 web browser." wrote Mozilla on this day in 2004.

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Many people were aghast when Microsoft forked over a hefty $8.5 billion in May of 2011 to purchase Skype. The software giant took awhile to get going with its new toy, but now we are starting to see the results. Microsoft announced a brand new platform set to improve communications for small business.

Skype in the workspace connects these companies to customers, partners and suppliers all around the world. The best part may be the price -- "It's a free-to-use online platform for small businesses and entrepreneurs" states Skype's Ural Cebeci. So far, so good.

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DARPA, or the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency as it is technically known, has a history of turning seemingly crazy ideas into reality. Now this branch of the Defense Department pursues a new camera/sensor system designed to aid soldiers' vision on the battlefield.

The agency describes it this way: "As missions shift, however, and warfighters are required to work in smaller teams and access more remote locations, it is technology that must adapt if it is to remain useful. Desirable features for many new man-portable systems include small size, light weight, minimal power consumption, low cost, ease of use, multi-functionality and, to the extent possible, network friendliness".

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It's not exactly a secret that Microsoft wants everyone to have an Xbox or that the company just recently released it's very first tablet in the form of the Surface RT, with a Windows 8 Pro model coming soon. But, would Microsoft actually consider combining these two seemingly different platforms?

Some people seem to think that may happen, but I want to talk the company down from the ledge and say "Please abandon this silly idea" before it becomes the biggest blunder since Bob. In fact, I would love to scream at the company NO! It would be a terrible and costly stumble by the Redmond, Wash. folks.

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Thanksgiving may still be a couple of weeks away, but web retailing giant Amazon is already in the holiday spirit. Last week the retailer introduced its Black Friday store and now trots out the Amazon Santa app. Yes, Kris Kringel has finally moved into the digital age with his very own app. Now you don't have to worry if that old fashioned hand-written letter will arrive at the North Pole in time, just send the old man a digital wishlist.

These days our kids are very tech-savvy and snail mail is becoming somewhat of a memory. So why not set little Johnny or Jane up with a way to convey gift wishes in a manner that is understood by their generation? That's where Amazon steps in to fill the void. Amazon Santa will let you sign into your account, then you can allow your children to start browsing the store and creating their wish lists. While they think their lists will be forwarded safely into Santa's hands, you can browse for gift ideas and even share with family members who are wondering what to purchase.

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You may not think of your local church as an IT hub or even a small business, but guess again! It turns out that these humble houses of the holy are expected to become a global IT spending machine over the next few years. In fact, according to a recent report, this branch of the tech economy could generate as much as 40 billion dollars by the year 2017. And, this isn't just a United States phenomenon, but a global one.

According to Asheesh Raina, principal research analyst at Gartner, "Religion has a great influence on high-growth regions such as Latin America, Africa, the Arab world and South Asia, thus compelling new entrants and incumbent IT providers to seek new opportunities with religious entities".

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While security company Kaspersky Labs recently gave Microsoft high marks late last week, it seems that it has given a failing grade to Google for version 2.3 of its Android mobile operating system.

Kaspersky's recent numbers show the Gingerbread release, specifically version 2.3.6, is the most highly targeted Android OS for malware developers, and Trojan SMS leads the way. That is followed, a bit distantly, by Java, which has also been a thorn in the side of computer users recently. While this is bad news for Google, it does have a silver lining.

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Amazon has quietly rolled out a new pricing plan for its premium membership service Amazon Prime which finally allows customers to make monthly payments instead of annual lump sum fees. That's all good right? Not so fast...

With Amazon Prime, subscribers get a lot of benefits from the popular online retailer: Free Two-Day, Standard, and no-rush Shipping, access to the Prime Instant Video streaming service, and access to the Kindle Lending Library where subscribers can freely borrow and read Kindle books as often as they like.

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AT&T has already officially told us of two new Windows Phone 8 handsets coming to their service with the Nokia Lumia 820 and 920, both of which will soon launch. Now the company has unveiled two tablets as well -- one running the new Microsoft operating system and the other Android. The company seems to be staying on the Microsoft bandwagon by adopting Windows 8 tablets and perhaps they see an opportunity to hitch their wagon to a growing platform. The mobile carrier today, not only announced it will launch the new Samsung ATIV Smart PC, but also hedged its bets with an Android tablet in the form of the Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 10.1.

Samsung has been in the news a lot recently with the Apple apology and news of their sales numbers for the Galaxy Note 2. With all of the public attention Samsung has received it seems the devices could be hits for AT&T. After all, the Apple lawsuits really provided some PR for their rival and, as the saying goes, "there is no such thing as bad publicity". Then again, price is everything and AT&T isn't doing their customers any favors here. Here are some specs and the prices AT&T will be offering, as well as their release date.

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HP has made numerous outreach attempts to the open source community, even going so far as to donate webOS not long after they purchased Palm for $3.3 billion. Now, the company has donated a whopping $500,000 USD to the Linux Foundation in order to become a Platinum member, joining several other large corporations like Samsung, NEC, Oracle and Intel. The Foundation is a nonprofit organization that dedicates itself to spreading the Linux family.

While Linux never quite became the popular desktop alternative that many hoped it would, it does power the vast majority of the servers that run the Internet. Even desktop operating systems like Ubuntu have become much more user friendly, and many flavors of the OS are capable of running on less powerful machines than those needed to run Windows and OSX. Hewlett Packard has long built servers for Linux-based systems, and even their printers, which can be found in many homes and businesses, run on the platform. The company has been a lesser-tier member of the Foundation for some time.

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