11:21 AM by Bob Russell in Miscellaneous | Lounge

www.ereader.com is also offering a free ebook each day in July.

This free book should also change daily, and there are some other deals available on the same page. (Click on Super Summer Spectacular banner at the top of the page and then scroll down for the free book.)

Enjoy!

02:52 PM by sUnShInE in Miscellaneous | Lounge

Each day through the remainder of July, PalmGear.com and PocketGear.com will be giving away 1 FREE program on each site. The free program changes daily, and is only offered on that particular day. Today's Palm program is Handmark Checklist, and for PPC it's PPCDesktop.

Check out the Palm deals here and PPC deals here. Scroll to the bottom of the page to find the freebie.

In addition, they also have some pretty good price specials. Sale items for Palm include Backup Buddy for Windows at $10 off, Wine Enthusiast Guide 2004 for $4 off, and a few more.

Plus, for every purchase you make -- sale priced or not -- from PalmGear.com, eReader.com or PocketGear.com through the end of July automatically enters you into a contest for free gift certificates or a Caribbean cruise.

Don't forget to check back for the daily freebie every day through July!

05:34 PM by Alexander Turcic in Miscellaneous | Announcements

Hello guys and girls!!

I am sorry not to have mentioned it earlier. I am finally on the vacation I've been longing for for the past few months! I am going to spend my next three weeks in Dubrovnik (images), Croatia, which is a world cultural heritage site on the Adriatic Sea. It is also my second home town, because my father was born and raised here. I am sure my opinion is biased (because of my family background), but I seriously think that Dubrovnik is one of the nicest places on this planet (and I have been already to a lot of nice places), a place which is worth the trip even if you have to travel thousands of miles coming from North America. I will spent most of my time here with my girlfriend exploring new islands by boat, eating a lot of sea food, and helping my parents to move furniture into a new house.

All my Internet activitiy will be limited to occasional visits to one of the various Internet Cafés here (there is even one Internet place just by the beach, no joke!).

I am sure some of you guys will also be away in the sun or on some adventure trip this summer. To those unfortunate who have to bite in the bullet and stay in the office: I'd be happy if you could manage this place in the time being without me

I keep you informed if something new and exciting happens on my vacation.

Sunny Greets,
Alex

12:45 PM by Alexander Turcic in Archive | Handhelds and Smartphones

News from JAVOedge: New screen protectors for the O2 Xphone / Qtek 8080 / iMate Smartphone2; the protector is made of non-reflective material which clings on to the screen with a silicon based surface leaving no sticky residue.
You can buy it either Single - $8.25 or in a 3x Bundle Pack - $21.04. I've heard good things about the JAVOedge protectors, so have a look if you are in need of protecting your screen from scratches.

08:49 AM by Bob Russell in Archive | Mobile Sites

It seems like we all are looking for news sources these days. But with all of the news and information sources on the web, many of us are facing information overload. There are many ways to deal with this, but more and more common is a retreat to familiar comfortable sources like local newspapers.

You can always "Google" the sites, but here's another nice alternative, if you are searching for newspapers in the US... www.newspaperlinks.com

Tip: Most sites can be read in mobile form if you take some time with your favorite clipping software like iSiloX or Plucker. But the work might already be done for you. Check out the newspaper's site map, and look for mobile or pda versions. Sometimes one exists under a section like "site features." It's hit-and-miss, but there are a lot out there.

And at your desk or laptop, before you venture out with your PDA or smartphone, check out http://www.newseum.org/todaysfrontpages/ to see what's on front pages across the world.

Also be sure to visit the MobileRead forums. There's a wealth of news sources and information about reading them on your mobile device.

09:41 PM by Bob Russell in Archive | Handhelds and Smartphones

European Commission publishes mobile broadband services plan

In a recently published document, the European Commission has called for increased R&D spending for mobile communication, commerce and content delivery. The ever increasing speed of business makes the extension of activities into the mobile computing world a matter of urgency, and this commission publication is intended to encourage the growth of technology.

According to the document, some of the hurdles to overcome include strengthening patent protections for mobile technology and improving the framework for intellectual property. In addition, rules and technology for mobile e-commerce are seen as a key challenge.

That's good news for fans of mobile computing!

For further reading check out these resources:
http://www.dmeurope.com/default.asp?ArticleID=2213
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/07...eless_r_and_d/
http://www.unstrung.com/document.asp?doc_id=55591
http://europa.eu.int/information_soc...m/index_en.htm

02:53 PM by sUnShInE in Miscellaneous | Lounge

Important Notice: The U.S. government's Computer Emergency Readiness Team (US-CERT) is warning web surfers to stop using Microsoft's Internet Explorer (IE) browser and use a different browser after last week's sophisticated malware attack targeted a known IE flaw.

US-CERT, a non-profit partnership between the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the public and private sectors, was established in September 2003 to improve computer security preparedness and response to cyber-attacks in the U.S.

A vulnerability statement on the CERT site said: "There are a number of significant vulnerabilities in technologies relating to the IE domain/zone security model, the DHTML object model, MIME type determination, and ActiveX. It is possible to reduce exposure to these vulnerabilities by using a different web browser, especially when browsing untrusted sites." CERT otherwise recommends, among other things, that users set security settings to high and to disable Active scripting and ActiveX.

All over the net security researchers have spent a lot of time beating the "Dump IE" drum, and the CERT notice lends credibility to stoke the movement away from the "world's most popular browser".

More from Internet News and The Register.

Note: I realize that MobileRead users are smarter than the average netster, but I figured I'd pass this along to anyone who's still riding the holey IE train. Just because it came pre-installed on your computer, doesn't mean it's any good.

01:43 PM by Colin Dunstan in Archive | Portable Audio/Video

Portable Media World makes us happy today with some new information on the portable video players Archos AV400 and AV500. While the AV400 model will replace the AV3x0 range, the AV500 will be a top-range model, featuring PDA functionalities and a touch screen (available last quarter 2004).

The resolution of the 3.5" screen is enough to display 320 x 240 pixels, and can display larger movies, up to 704x480. It can read MP3, WMA, MPEG4 and DIVX5 / Xvid.