Perhaps showing my age, I was so engrained in USENET since nearly the very beginning of the service in the early 80′s that I stayed using it long after most folks had moved to web forums. That was until around 2003 or 2004, when I found that splitting my time between dwindling USENET activity and climbing web activity was just too much. Yet even then I still lamented the loss – it was (and still is) incredibly inefficient to seek information about a given subject sprawled across dozens of websites and blogs when a single – or few – USENET groups used to contain loads of experts on the subject. For example, I am… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Jeff Vogel of Spiderweb Software has managed to create entire franchises that appeal to RPG fans of single-hero style and party-based games. The Avernum (and now Avadon) games feature a full adventuring party to help you explore the quest, whereas the Geneforge games are focused around a single lead character. This week Spiderweb and Steam announced the availability of the entire Geneforge Saga on Steam! Even better – for a limited time the franchise package is 20% off! That means hundreds of hours of quality gaming for just $16! Here is the press release: Spiderweb Software (http://www.spiderwebsoftware.com) is pleased to announce the award-winning Geneforge Saga is now available on Steam at an Continue reading on Gear Diary …

I’ve been watching my copies of the TV show “Firefly” lately (and if you haven’t ever watched it, you should).  Why do I mention this?  Well, aside from the fact that I often write in a nearly stream-of-consciouness fashion and it’s been on whatever passes for my mind lately, when I surfed to the USBFever web site to look at this week’s offerings, one phrase that they use in “Firefly” just jumped into my mind when I saw the cases above: “Shiny!” In “Firefly,” it indicates general approval, like, “Cool”, or “Excellent!”, or what have you.  In this case, it was more a description of the actual appearance of the cases.  But still, don’t you… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

  NoMoreClipboard.com A few years ago I started a Google Health account. I loved it. I had my entire medical history and medications in one place. Unfortunately Google Health is going away. So I started to search for a replacement. My criteria were as follows: Easy to use Can hold my medical record Can hold my current and past medications Can Print out a summary sheet of my medical history and medications Ability to add documentation from my medical providers Ability to give my medical providers limited access to my medical history Secure based off of Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) standards There is not… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Welcome back to the GearGames weekly video game release feature here at Gear Diary! This week we have two massive releases that will each result in millions of copies sold, with one already gaining an estimate of more than a billion dollars in revenue! Those games are Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 and The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. While Modern Warfare 3 will be the larger game in terms of sales, Skyrim is more anticipated for a few reasons: first, it has been five years since the last entry, the highly over-rated but still amazing and successful Oblivion. Since Call of Duty has basically become ‘Madden with guns’, there isn’t much to anticipate… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

  One of the features that iOS 5.0 brought to the table was their new Newsstand application. Newsstand is to magazines and newspapers what iBooks is to books. It collects your magazine and newspaper subscriptions purchased through the iTunes App Store and puts them into one simple place where all are accessible. It has a nice feature in that most of the periodicals can be set to automatically download when a new addition becomes available. That means that, for example, each day my New York Times is ready and waiting for me as soon as I open my iPad’s cover and pour my cup of coffee. That’s all good, and it is a… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

As a small town guy living in the Chicago area, there are a lot times when I get frustrated with the traffic, the density, and the general inconveniences that are necessarily associated with urban living. Then again, there are times like today, when I’m happy to be living in one of the larger metropolitan areas in the country because we tend to be among the first to get new technologies, such as AT&T’s new LTE network. At the moment, AT&T has two phones able to take advantage of the LTE network: the HTC Vivid and the Samsung Galaxy S II Skyrocket. The Vivid offers a 4.5 inch qHD screen, but the Skyrocket has a slightly faster processor and is part of the popular Galaxy S II line of Samsung… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Have I mentioned lately that I really like it when stuff is FREE? I’m sure I have; as Sami often points out, I have an unfortunate tendency to repeat myself.  Which doesn’t make it any less of a pleasure to let you folks know when there’s something available for FREE.  Like this here Blackberry messaging app, Chit Chat.  I’ll let the makers tell it: We have reduced the price of our instant messenger from $1.99 to free - that’s right, it’s completely free. Given this price change, I feel that you may be interested in featuring our product on your website. Why Use Chit Chat? Allows access to Facebook chat on your mobile world wide Continue reading on Gear Diary …

If you love Android smartphones today’s Gear Deal is for you! Today’s deal brings us the just released, Samsung Galaxy S II Skyrocket 4.5″ dual-core Android Smartphone for AT&T. The Galaxy S II Skyrocket features a 4.5″ 480×800 super AMOLED display, has 3G AND 4G LTE connectivity, runs on a 1.5GHz dual-core processor, has an 8MP rear camera and a 2MP front camera, has 1GB of RAM, offers 16GB of built-in storage which is expandable via the microSD, has Samsung’s TouchWiz UI, HDMI connectivity, Bluetooth, GPS, and, of course, Android 2.3OS. The phone has an MSRP of $599.99 but is on sale for $249.99. Our Gear Sponsor has pointed us toward some additional savings… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

In an effort to try to force the Occupy Wall Street folks off their perch, New York City ordered them to remove their electrical generators (on some pretext, I’m sure).  Being young nerds, that didn’t stop these folks; instead, they set up a bunch of stationary bicycles, hooked them into the power grid, and started pumping away.  They are now generating more power with these bikes than they did previously with the generators (plus staying in awesome shape and keeping warm).  Good work, ingenious NYC geeks! Perhaps what they need to help them is Velocomp’s new iBike Workout app for the iPad.  Here’s what Velocomp says: Velocomp www.iBikeDash.com, a leading sports technology company and creator Continue reading on Gear Diary …

If you are looking for something that offers a bit more than iPhoto or iMovie but without breaking the bank, Adobe’s Photoshop Elements and Premiere Elements have always provided a great choice. Of course, as there is no real alternative to iLife on the PC, those apps are an excellent choice for anyone wanting to manipulate photos and video on that platform. Over the last few weeks I have been testing out Photoshop Elements and Premiere Elements and will have a review soon, but today Adobe announces the availability of Photoshop Elements and Premiere Elements on the Mac App Store, bringing with it the ease of installation and updating Mac users enjoy with… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Last week we took a look at two high-tech bags from Powerbag. The PowerBag Messenger and the PowerBag Backpack both pack 6000mAh batteries and an interior system of charging cables so you can keep your mobile electronics charged on the go. The Messenger will be coming to CES with me and the Backpack will be used by Kevin during the week. Between the two bags we are hoping to avoid our annual tradition of struggling to keep our phones and tablets charged during the grueling days in Las Vegas. But what if you want to carry lots of stuff, need to make sure it won’t get damaged if it rains and don’t need… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Yes, okay, Halloween is over, but as I mentioned in another post, we’re still fascinated by zombies and ghouls and witches in this culture.  Hell, I’m reading a book called “The Magicians” that’s considered Lit-ruh-chure (with a capital “Lit”), and the top-selling author on planet Earth is a woman who writes about witches and wizards.  It’s the era we live in. So even though I can’t say, “Hey, check out these iPod Touch cases for Halloween!”, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t check them out.  Quite the contrary, in fact; given our fascination with the macabre, any time is a good time for this kind of thing.  Check ‘em out, while they’re still on sale! Full… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Late last week one of the big features of the recently released iPhone 4S – Siri – suffered an outage, which was widely reported. Beyond that, there were those who took the outage to indicate either massive success … or massive failure on the part of Apple and the service. But I see something different … loneliness. If you look back to the very first few things people tested on the iPhone 4S with Siri, it was telling it they loved it. You can see it featured in this Gizmodo article from right after the launch. And here are just a few ‘Siri … I Love You’ clips… Continue reading on Gear Diary …

Okay, let’s face it:  there’s simply no way you would ever catch me wearing any of this stuff.  I’m a nerd and a geek, sure, but this stuff is simply too cutesy, even for me. BUT, that doesn’t mean that it’s not right for you, or your kids, or your friends, or whoever … and if you watch The Big Theory, then you’ll probably already get what this shirt is all about. I’m a middle-aged dweeb; aside from having no style sense whatsoever, I am (by definition) completely unhip.  Or so my teenage kids keep telling me.  So you, my friend, should decide for yourself if the stuff, listed in detail below, is for you or not… Continue reading on Gear Diary …