Alan Buckingham

The Kindle has been big news recently, with Amazon rolling out a new version of its Fire HD, as well as 7 and 8.9-inch versions of a brand new Kindle Fire HDX, the latest iteration of its Android tablet. Not stopping there, the retailer introduced a case known as the Origami, but now has taken it one step further, with a personalized version of your own choosing.

"Customers can now design their own Amazon Origami covers and a variety of other covers and skins for Kindle by uploading photographs from their own library, choosing from a variety of Amazon designs made exclusively for Amazon Origami covers, or choosing from a library of hundreds of images, logos, designs and patterns—including popular comic, movie and television show graphics from Peanuts, National Geographic, Breaking Bad, Star Trek, and more", states Amazon.

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Google continues to expand its Street View imagery to new areas, ranging from the Great Barrier Reef to the Grand Canyon and countless locations in between. This time, the intrepid team has invaded the canals of Venice, Italy. The romantic city can now be viewed by armchair travelers everywhere, no gondola required.

The city presented a new challenge for the Google team -- "It was impossible for us to collect images of Venice with a Street View car or trike -- blame the picturesque canals and narrow cobbled walkways -- but our team of backpackers took to the streets to give Google Maps a truly Shakespearean backdrop", says Daniele Rizzetto, Street View Operations Manager.

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Cloud storage and sharing service Dropbox has been looking to grow its footprint in the business industry, adding Dropbox for Business, along with a steady stream of new features for the service. Now the company is attempting to consolidate its enterprise efforts with those for home users.

"On one hand, people wanted to access their personal stuff at work; meanwhile, IT admins wanted to keep company data separate and free of personal files. Both needs were real, but people had to choose between two Dropboxes", claims the company.

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There is a market in education, and both Apple and Microsoft pursue it with iPads, Office and more. Now Google is looking to get in on the action with its Android mobile operating system. The search giant wants you to bring a tablet to school, and is rolling out a special version of its Play store designed to make this simpler.

"Today we're launching tablets with Google Play for Education for K-12 schools in the US. For the past five months, thousands of students and more than 50 schools have used Google Play for Education and shared their experiences as part of our beta program", says the company's Rock Borovoy.

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While Windows, at least arguably so, has become more efficient with each new version, it's still far from fault-free. System problems still rear ugly heads -- check the action center and you will likely find something awaiting you. There is no end to the amount utilities that purport to help you fix these errors, but some are useless and a few are just malware, so it's frequently best to go with a reputable piece of software, even if it costs a few dollars.

System Mechanic describes itself as "an all-in-one PC tune-up utility software suite that analyzes, fixes, optimizes, and maintains Windows computers. It incorporates multiple patented and patent-pending technologies, such as ActiveCare, a technology that allows the program to run automatic maintenance scans and repairs on a Windows PC while a computer is on but not in use".

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In the ongoing battle for your entertainment dollars, video streaming service Netflix announces a brand new makeover and Roku is one of the early adopters, announcing it is bringing the update to its Roku 3 set-top boxes. The effort is another move from Netflix to stay ahead of competitors like Amazon Prime and Redbox Instant.

"Today we are excited to unveil the biggest update in Netflix history to our TV experience. This update improves the Netflix TV for Netflix members around the world", states the streaming company.

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The set-top box market continues to heat up, with Roku, Apple TV and Google TV going head-to-head for your entertainment dollars. Despite the best efforts of cable and satellite providers, customers continue to look towards services like Hulu, Netflix and Amazon for their television entertainment.

Now Roku, one of the big players in this growing ecosystem, stokes the fire a bit more today. The hardware maker announces the availability of both ESPN and Disney arriving on its platform.

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Microsoft has been busy on many fronts recently, from the desktop to the living room, to business. The latest update released by the company is for businesses, though home users can also benefit. Microsoft today announces a new update that brings Office 365 to new markets and languages.

The software giant now boasts 123 markets for its latest iteration of the suite, also allowing new customers to grab a 120-day free trial before making a decision about whether or not to reach for their wallets.

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Little brings more emotion to daily life than music. For many people it's a part of the psyche, lending meaning to everyday events, leaving memories that are specifically associated with a particular song. For instance, reggae songs can bring visions of summer, while Air Supply dredges up memories of middle school dances.

Bing now wishes to help you find all of those sappy songs, in video form -- though the search engine also promises to help find the newer and less sappy ones as well.

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There is an ever-growing list of benefits that Amazon provides for its Prime customers. For a $79 yearly fee users enjoy Netflix-like streaming video, Kindle book rentals and free two-day delivery service. The latter has only one simple drawback -- if you order an item on a Friday, you need to wait until Monday for the product to land on your doorstep. Well, at least that was the case, until now.

Today the retail giant announces the start of Sunday deliveries. To accomplish this, Amazon has teamed up with the United States Postal Service, beginning in the Los Angeles and New York City areas.

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This week, November 12th to be precise, is that holiday we have come to call Patch Tuesday. It's the day when Microsoft rolls out fixes for bugs, both small and large, in its software, from Windows to Office and more. This month's releases are of particular interest, not because of what the company is fixing, but what it has chosen to leave unpatched.

November's update includes eight patches, three of which have been tagged as 'critical'. Microsoft even promises it "will host a webcast to address customer questions on the security bulletins on November 13, 2013, at 11:00 AM Pacific Time".

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November 9, 2004. The date may not mean much to you, but it was rather big in the land of Mozilla. It wasn't the 'start' of the Firefox web browser, but it was the official ship date of version 1.0. That makes today a birthday celebration for the browser that dared to take on the Internet Explorer-giant.

"In the nine years since we first launched Firefox, we have moved and shaped the Web into the most valuable public resource of our time", the organization announces.

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Amazon began shipping its seven-inch Kindle Fire HDX back on October 18, going directly after the Google Nexus for supremacy of the low-price tablet market. Now the company follows up by announcing that the larger version is heading out the door today.

The 8.9-inch Fire HDX weighs in at 13.2 ounces, which Amazon claims makes it "the lightest large-screen tablet". It also features a 339 ppi display, and boasts three times the processing power, two times the memory and four times the graphics performance of the previous generation. Fire OS 3.0, the new mobile operating system, also features a "mayday" button -- for those in need of a bit of hand-holding.

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Amazon Prime, at least the video arm of it, has been rolling along and seemingly gaining momentum recently. New original content has debuted, with some shows picked up for a season run, and more are currently in the pipeline. However, finding this menu of new videos has not always been easy, save when the company displays links on its homepage.

Rather than relying on a fortunate link or a search of the content, Amazon is giving viewers an option to fast-forward straight to what's new, and do so ahead of your friends.

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Microsoft, while not innovating at Mozilla-Google rate, has been stepping up development of Internet Explorer -- thankfully moving on from the dim, dark days of IE6. Windows 8.1 comes with the shiny new Internet Explorer 11, and with that release Google implements plans to begin phasing out version 9 of the browser.

Don't panic yet -- this move is for Google Apps, a service used more in the business realm than the home. It really should not come as a surprise, as the search giant holds firm to a policy of support for current and previous browser versions -- in other words IE 10 and 11 now.

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