Computer Support Blog

This week, the U.S. Department of Justice takes Apple to court.  The government claims that the computer technology giant was part of a conspiracy to fix prices in the eBook market along with five major publishing companies.  Allegedly, Apple worked with all of the major publishers to radically change the eBook market and enforce their preferred “agency” model as opposed to the standard wholesale model.  Amazon, the dominant retailer of eBooks before Apple entered the market in 2010, sold eBooks on a wholesale model.  This model involved paying publishers a fixed price for each eBook sold, and then reselling it to the consumer at whatever price a company chose.  The wholesale model allows retailers to choose their own profit margins on books they sell.  The government says that Apple tried to create a new standard by working with publishers to replace this wholesale model. Apple’s new agency model had publishers, not retailers, set a standard retail price for eBooks. Retailers then received a 30% cut of the price specified by the publisher.  Read more »

Busywork taking time away from productivity is a problem in many workspaces, but one of the most damaging places this issue pops up in is education.  Teachers waste many hours hand-grading quizzes and tests when they could spend those hours on lesson plans and finding better ways to engage students every semester, both in primary and secondary education settings.  However, the team at Design by Educators, Inc. has developed an iPhone app that they believe could help solve this problem for good.  Quick Key is an application that allows for quick, efficient grading and it only requires a smartphone to work.  In theory, this program could be able to save many teachers’ hours of time grading that they can put back into making the classroom a better space for learning.  Read more »

There has been a major shift in consumer purchasing behavior in the personal computer market over the last two years.  Traditional desktop and laptop PCs, have seen significant decline in year-over-year sales.  In the first quarter of 2013, there was an 11.7% year-over-year drop in shipments for the traditional PC market in the United States.  Meanwhile, US tablet shipments grew 49.6% year-over-year in the same quarter.  These statistics show an important shift for consumers towards mobile computing.  These numbers also made Rescuecom’s decision to include tablets as part of the RESCUECOM Computer Reliability Report for Q1 2013 that much easier.  It’s clear that many users are choosing to take their computing mobile with tablet purchases.  It would be foolish to ignore this trend. Read more »

Most of us have experienced it at one point or another: you’ve finished your meal at a restaurant and its taking far too long for the servers simply to close out your bill.  Many have probably wondered if there was a way for recent advances in mobile technology, like smartphones and tablets, to improve this process.  TabbedOut sets out to do exactly that.  TabbedOut is an app found on both iOS and Android devices that allows patrons to check in to a restaurant and then pay their check when they are finished via their mobile device.  In theory, this could save both the customer and servers valuable time and improve the overall experience of eating out.  While there are many apps and services for purchasing take-out food, TabbedOut is unique in that it focuses on the experience of dining out.  However, if you have problems operating the mobile app, you should ask mobile support for help. Read more »

Image editing is a task most of us have to do on our computers at one point or another.  We often need to fix our vacation photographs, create a flier for an event, or a myriad of other possibilities.  Unfortunately, most image editors fall into two categories: they’re either simplistic and mostly useless or expensive and overly complex.  This doesn’t have to be the case.  Gus Mueller, founder of Flying Meat Software, has developed an image editor for Mac OS X called Acorn.  Mueller designed Acorn to be accessible for those who want to make their photo editing an easier experience. Read more »

Phishing attacks have become an increasing problem as of late both for everyday computer users and even major publications.  In the last month, there have been widespread phishing attacks aimed at both Apple and Twitter accounts.  These attacks come in the form of e-mails or web pages that seem as if they were from a service the recipient uses.  These e-mails trick recipients into giving over information, which then lets the cybercriminals access their accounts.

The phishing attacks aimed at Apple users mimicked an account verification page from Apple and prompted users to give their e-mail, credit card information, and account password.  This particular attack compromised over one hundred websites, which displayed the page that tricked Apple users into handing over their information.  Without proper Internet security service or software, it would be difficult to detect the attack for most people.  The intent of such attacks is to gain access to people’s Apple accounts.  Criminals will then sell the information or use it to compromise the accounts themselves. Read more »

 The world truly is interconnected by telecommunications technology now.  Even so, there are gaps in the worldwide network and the people who explore those gaps are often the individuals who would benefit most from having reliable technology.  Where smartphones may fail or one might find themselves out of network – on the open sea, in the wilderness, hiking and/or climbing – there are technologies that may allow you to communicate with the rest of the world and the mainstream communications networks.  One of the premiere companies providing such communication channels is DeLorme.  DeLorme has an impressive satellite network that allows its devices, like the Inreach For Smartphones, to operate wherever you are on Earth. Read more »

The popularity of Apple’s mobile computing devices has led many manufacturers to create accessories that attempt to make Apple’s products even better.  While Apple’s mobile devices, like the iPad, iPhone, and iPod lines are convenient for travel, they may be less-than-ideal for presenting media in a home environment.  Seeking to augment the usefulness of your iPod or iPhone, Denon now makes a cool iPod/Networking Client Dock With Wi-Fi. Read more »

The name Hallmark Cards is virtually synonymous with greeting cards, much the way people refer to MP3 players as iPods or inline skates as Rollerblades.  To its credit in the rapidly changing world, Hallmark Cards has worked very hard to keep with the times and it has a robust online presence.  The physical greeting card manufacturer effectively competes against many online digital greeting card sites and Hallmark Cards continues to innovate.  Seeing the intense interest in mobile computing among many of its fans, Hallmark Cards has released the Hallmark Go Cards application! Read more »

The results are in for RESCUECOM’s Second Quarter 2012 Computer Reliability Report, which has Samsung taking the gold! Read more »