from ghacks which describes the value of this tool well:

If you are a cautious user on the Internet you might want to find out as much as possible about sites that you are going to visit before actually visiting them. The basic concept of Link Extend is to provide a wide range of information about a selected link. It queries more than 20 different web services and displays the results in an overlay on the same page. Results are divided into different categories like Safety, Kid Safe or Ethics.

Each web service rates the link that has been analyzed. This ranges from low risk to high risk websites in the Safety category, safe, suspicious or unsafe in the Kid Safe category or very good and very bad in the Ethics category. A total of eight different services are queried in the safety category including Site Advisor, Google Safe Browsing or Norton. The other two categories make use of three services each like WOT, Icra or Corporate Critic.

https://addons.mozil.../firefox/addon/10777

So many people are suffering economically these days. You might be saying to yourself "I could really use some schadenfreude about now, to cheer myself up by watching a spectacular implosion of someone else's financial dreams on a much larger scale."

Well here are two modern day masterpieces of documentary film making that are sure to satisfy.

Startup.com:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Startup.com
http://www.netflix.c...Startup.com/70003079
By the end of this movie you will be cheering for the failure of this company

e-dreams:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Dreams
http://www.netflix.c...ie/e-Dreams/60025131
These guys are quite a bit more sympathetic and human than the founders of startup.com, but still..

how many times is this going to happen with adobe before we start rebelling against this software?

Bad news for anyone that utilizes Adobe's Acrobat software, or Adobe reader to view PDF files. A critical vulnerability has been identified that can cause the applications to crash and allow an attacker to control the affected system. All versions from 7 forward on all operating systems are suspected to be at risk.

According to the announcement from Adobe, this isn't just a possibility, it's actually happening. Reports have already been made of the buffer overflow exploit being used in this type of attack. Adobe is also working with antivirus vendors to patch the holes, and patches to update the vulnerable apps are in the works. The bad news: patches aren't likely to be ready until March 11th, 2009.

http://www.adobe.com...ories/apsa09-01.html

Clever.

"Web developers increasingly grow weary of having to put so much effort into designing their sites according to the whims of the Google search engine. When the most important thing is 'getting indexed' it is increasingly difficult for web site designers to offer the simple, uncluttered user experience they'd like to. Reminiscent of the famed what if Microsoft designed the iPod box here is a humorous look at what would happen to that famed, clean, uncluttered look if Google had to design for the Google Search Engine."

http://www.meangene....sign_for_google.html

I was curious today about iphone software development, and came across this from 2008:

Allowing Flash — which is a development platform of its own — would just be too dangerous for Apple, a company that enjoys exerting total dominance over its hardware and the software that runs on it. Flash has evolved from being a mere animation player into a multimedia platform capable of running applications of its own. That means Flash would open a new door for application developers to get their software onto the iPhone: Just code them in Flash and put them on a web page. In so doing, Flash would divert business from the App Store, as well as enable publishers to distribute music, videos and movies that could compete with the iTunes Store.

Apple's well aware of these problems, which is why the company wrote a clause in its iPhone developers' Terms of Service agreement (.pdf) that prohibits Flash from appearing on the iPhone.."

from http://blog.wired.co.../adobe-flash-on.html

A great 1hr show on PBS (public broadcasting service in the US), about the recent economic panics in the united states.  You can watch the full thing online now.. very informative, and *infuriating*.

On Thursday, Sept. 18, 2008, the astonished leadership of the U.S. Congress was told in a private session by the chairman of the Federal Reserve that the American economy was in grave danger of a complete meltdown within a matter of days.

http://www.pbs.org/w...tline/meltdown/view/