The BBC has announced that programming from BBC America [iTunes link] is now available on the iTunes Store. Customers can now purchase single episodes or complete seasons of the BBC AMERICA series ”Torchwood,” ”Little Britain,” and ”Robin Hood.”

Sling Media today released three updated versions of SlingPlayer Mobile improving video quality, adding more handsets and more. SlingPlayer Mobile for PocketPC (1.6), Windows Smartphone (1.6), and Symbian S60 (1.1) are each available for download.

SlingPlayer Mobile allows users to view content from and control their home television from their mobile phone. The upgrade to the new version is free if you already own SlingPlayer Mobile, otherwise the client can be had for a $29.99.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) has sent an open letter sent to Microsoft Chief Executive Officer Steve Ballmer today, outlining five steps Microsoft must take to make things right for MSN Music customers — including a issuing a public apology, providing refunds or replacement music files, and launching a substantial publicity campaign to make sure all customers know their options.

“MSN Music customers trusted Microsoft when it said that this was a safe way to buy music, and that trust has been betrayed,” said EFF Staff Attorney Corynne McSherry. “If Microsoft is prepared to treat MSN Music customers like this, is there any reason to suppose that future customers won’t get the same treatment?”

I could not agree more.

Sharing your music across the Internet the easy way. Works with iTunes and Winamp. SimplifyMedia is available for free on Macs and PCs and there is some experimental support for Linux and even the iPhone!

Why may I ask can Zoho add support for VBA Macros on their FREE “online” spreadsheet while the expensive Office for Mac 2008 upgrade can’t?

Zoho has announced a huge update to Zoho Sheet that includes the ability to import and create VBA macros in your spreadsheets. Granted they only support about 50% of the functionality at this point, but it is better than the 0% I got for paying Microsoft $240 for an upgrade. See video after the jump.

Continue reading ZOHO Sheet Now Supports VBA Macros…

Laptops are among the most popular stolen items. They are expensive, useful, and usually contain loads of personal information. Mac portables are a great attraction to thieves. For the same reasons that you were attracted to that very cool Apple hardware, so are the dishonest people among us that are just waiting to walk away with your prized MacBook, MacBook Pro, or MacBook Air.

In our household we were recently victims of a MacBook Pro theft. This event got me thinking of better ways to protect ourselves against a reoccurrence. The first thing you realize when your computer is stolen is that you just did not lose an expensive piece of hardware. You may have lost replaceable data, possibly your identity and personal information. Many of us carry around our lives on these machines. So losing one is quite a disruption that can have dangerous consequences.

Continue reading How To Prevent Losses From The Theft Of Your Mac…

Apple is celebrating the fifth anniversary of the iTunes Store with a look at back at “all of the great music, video, and exclusives” highlighting the songs and shows that defined each year. On its iTunes store, Apple is offering a brief history along with a collection of “best sellers.”

Continue reading iTunes Store Turns 5…

Adobe has announced that GoLive has been discontinued. The company has ceased development and sales of GoLive effective Monday, April 28, 2008.

Continue reading Adobe Drops GoLive…

Apple this morning has introduced major performance upgrade to the iMac line using Core 2 Duo processors based on Intel’s new 45 nanometer Penryn architecture. All models now include a 1,066MHz system bus that is still unavailable on any official Intel mobile Core 2 chip, and the top-end model runs at 3.06GHz. All additionally include a larger 6MB of Level 2 cache. An optional GeForce 8800 GS provides faster 3D for gaming is available on the 24-inch model.

Continue reading Performance Boosted iMacs Arrive This Morning…

Apple has introduced an update to the MacBook Pro that features multi-touch trackpads, bigger hard drives and faster Intel Core 2 Duo processors. I am a little late reporting this one.

Continue reading OS X Tip #159: Add Text Message to Login Window…

According a story at the Washington Post’s Security Blog, Hundreds of thousands of Web sites – including several at the United Nations and in the U.K. government — have been hacked recently and seeded with code that tries to exploit security flaws in Microsoft Windows to install malicious software on visitors’ machines.

The attackers appear to be breaking into the sites with the help of a security vulnerability in Microsoft’s Internet Information Services (IIS) Web servers. In an alert issued last week, Microsoft said it was investigating reports of an unpatched flaw in IIS servers, but at the time it noted that it wasn’t aware of anyone trying to exploit that particular weakness. Read the rest at the Washington Post’s Blog.

The video above is from around November 2007 where he smashes a Zune with a bat, so it is not so surprising that Jim Cramer from TheStreet.com is pro-Apple now. Jim Cramer is a well respected investment analyst, that was interviewed recently about Apple. Here is a link to the video where he explains that Apple’s competitors are no longer relevant.

When you put an audio CD into your web connected computer and it fetches the track information, you can thank Gracenote. Sony is buying Gracenote, the digital media company for about US$260 million “plus other consideration,” reports TechCrunch.

Microsoft has lost an attempt to reverse a lower court’s ruling in the ongoing “Vista Capable” lawsuit in an appeals court. This decision means the case can resume. We should expect some more embarrassing emails will probably emerge as new insider e-mails have been subpoenaed from Microsoft and nearly 30 other companies as being reported by ComputerWorld.

According to a Forbes article, Apple has agreed to buy P.A. Semi, a boutique microprocessor design company for $278 million in cash that may create a chips for future iPhone and iPod products.

The 150-person chip company, P.A. Semi, was founded in 2003 by Dan Dobberpuhl, who was a lead designer for the well-regarded Alpha and StrongARM microprocessors developed by Digital Equipment in the 1990s.

Continue reading Apple Buying Chip Company…

Seems Microsoft was not satisfied screwing over its “PlaysForSure” partners. Now it will leave the users who were unfortunate enough to have purchased music from their now-defunct MSN Music store realizing the there is NO way all the music they bought will “PLAY AT ALL.” I am sure many of these customers never thought they were just renting these tracks they paid good money for.

Microsoft will be shutting off the license servers that authorize customers computers to play these DRMed tracks. MSN Entertainment and Video Services general manager Rob Bennett sent out an e-mail this afternoon to customers, advising them to make any and all authorizations or deauthorizations before August 31.

Continue reading Microsoft Pulling the DRM plug on MSN Customers…

New updated version of ScreenFlow has been released sporting many improvements. ScreenFlow is the premiere screen capture tool for the Mac.

Skype has announced new calling plans that deserve some attention. For the unlimited calls U.S. and Canada just $2.95 per month, unlimited Mexico $5.95 per month and just $9.95 per month for unlimited World. This makes my Vonage look pretty expensive.

More details at the Skype Journal blog.