In the world of iPods and iPhones, there’s nothing more annoying than not being able to copy your music from them onto your hard drive. This is because Apple have locked both devices so that you can only copy music onto them but not vice-versa. This is incredibly frustrating if you want to replace a song you’ve lost or deleted in iTunes, your Mac has crashed and your iPod/iPhone is the only place you’ve saved your music, or if you simply want to transfer some songs between computers.

Fortunately, there are two excellent “unlocking” solutions for Mac in the form of Senuti and iPodRip. Both applications used to be free but now require a modest fee to use them. Both have free trial versions however and I put them both through their paces to see which is best.

Senuti

Firstly, Senuti supports both iPod and iPhones so if you own the latter as well, then it’s a no-brainer which to choose. The interface of Senuti is very clean and as soon as you connect your iPod, your music and playlists appear pretty much instantly. To transfer a song, you can either drag and drop them or select the song and click the clearly labeled “Transfer” button in the top left corner.

That’s about all there is to it. Once a track is transferred, it is denoted with a blue dot which tells you that it has already been transferred to your hard drive. You can also play songs simply by double clicking on them. The demo is limited to 30 days and 1000 song transfers but there’s no nag screen and the full license costs $18. Read the rest of this entry »

Twitter clients for the Mac are currently exploding onto the market at an increasing rate as developers big and small try to come up with the best client. Two offerings that I recently tried are Pwitter and Bluebird. Both are free and don’t require Adobe Air like many older twitter clients so they’re super lightweight and quick.

Firstly, Pwitter only runs in Leopard at the moment so older OS X users will have to wait for

a while. Pwitter is built on Cocoa which means the developers have been able to give it a very sleek interface. While the look and feel of it is excellent (utilising Core Animation technology) you are stuck with a black GUI. The best thing about Pwitter however is its simplicity. On installation, you’re prompted for your twitter username and password. Once you’ve entered them, you instantly start receiving tweets and can start publishing them. There’s no messing around configuring sounds, skins or window views. Even someone who’s never used twitter before, will be up and running with Pwitter within seconds.

Pwitter also supports Growl alerts so you’ll never miss a tweet. On the minus side, there is no way to configure the tweet alert sounds. While the default one isn’t bad, it would have been nice to have included some way to change this sound.

Bluebird meanwhile leaves no stone unturned in the customisation department. Setting it up is not quite as straightforward as Pwitter though. For example, there’s no auto-prompt to enter your twitter username and password when you install it - you have to work out how to add a new account yourself which isn’t difficult but may confuse newcomers to twitter.

Although Twitter clients rarely get “complicated”, Bluebird is ideal for the power user who wants maximum control over how their client looks and fees. It is built on a combination of a XHTML, CSS and Javascript base so it doesn’t benefit from the Cocoa that makes Pwitter so sleek. However, what it lacks in gloss it certainly makes up for in features including the ability to filter tweets, search them and change the theme in a click. There are 3 themes to choose from (including an iChat look) which is a bit limited but better than nothing. If you’ve got a bit of HTML and CSS knowledge however, you can create your own themes which means Bluebird can at least look anyway you want it to. Changing the default themes simply requires going into preferences and using the Themes selector tab.

What I liked most about Bluebird though is the sound editor. You can define separate sounds for incoming and outgoing tweets and direct messages. There are around 10 0r 15 sounds to choose from although unfortunately, you can’t preview them so you have to wait for a tweet to arrive to see what they sound like. Nevertheless, I rely on sounds more than Growl alerts (which Bluebird also supports) and this was a real winner for me. Perhaps one of the few drawbacks of Bluebird compared to Pwitter is that you can’t hide it from the dock as yet.

The more comfortable I get with twitter, the more I’m inclined towards Bluebird. I do prefer the slickness of Pwitter though overall. Now my only problem is to work out whether Demi Moore really is twittering or employing someone to do it for her.

iPhone users have today been buzzing about the prospect of making free calls, following the release (at long, last) of Skype on the Apple device. The client allows users to make free Skype-to-Skype calls over WiFi, and SkypeOut calls to anyone around the World over 3G. It marks a significant breakthrough for Skype, a company, perhaps quite rightly, feared by mobile network operators for the damage it could do to their cushy business models.

The new iPhone version of Skype will be a worry for Nimbuzz, which, until now, has been top of the pile in terms of iPhone chat apps. Until now, Nimbuzz offered the best way to make Skype calls from an iPhone. So, how does the official version of Skype compare with the Nimbuzz offering?

Firstly, it’s worth remembering that Nimbuzz is a multi-network client that allows you to pull all your contacts together in one place, so you can exchange messages with all your friends on networks such as MSN, AIM, Yahoo! Messenger, Google Talk, Jabber, Facebook, or MySpace - as well as Skype. The iPhone Skype client, however, is designed solely for Skype users and, as a result, has more of the native functions from the VoIP service.

Usability

The user interface in Nimbuzz combines all of your contacts from all these various networks in one place, and you can see who is online at any time. Everything is presented in a very neat and clear way: contacts are ordered alphabetically and each has a different icon depending on which network they belong to. You simply need to tap on a person’s name then select an icon from: Call, Chat or Mail.

The Skype UI is equally impressive. In fact, I would say it’s unerringly similar. Skype also has an alphabetized contacts, which is even easier to navigate than the one in the desktop version of the program. You can choose to view all of your contacts, or only the ones who are online. Click on a contact and their profile page will be loaded, giving you the option to either call them, chat, or view their full profile. Both Skype and Nimbuzz have similar, finger-friendly dialpads, for making calls over SkypeOut.

Read the rest of this entry »

If you were to fix up the heavyweight P2P TV battle of the World and then watch them smash each other’s brains out, then you’d surely have to go for Sopcast and TVAnts - two monsters of the P2P ring. I’ve probably come to rely on both of these two applications more than my TV for sports viewing over the past few years because of the wide access they offer to English football streamed on foreign channels.

What they offer though is two quite different P2P TV applications. While TVAnts is purely about broadcasting and is heavily dominated by Chinese channels, Sopcast not only broadcasts but allows you to create your own channels as well. How many people actually do bother to set up their own channel on Sopcast is another question since the vast majority in the West probably use it for sports viewing like myself.

Added to the fact that setting up your own channel is not particularly well explained, it’s not a big edge over TVAnts but at least it’s there if you want it. The existence of this option however does mean that Sopcast always prompts you if you want to log in on start-up which is a bit annoying. While also heavily influenced by Chinese channels, Sopcast however definitely has a broader range of channels from all over the world.

The important thing to consider with any P2P TV app though is does it stream content well and are the channel names and listings decipherable? In the case of TVAnts it’s a definite yes to the former and a resounding no to the latter. TVAnts offers some of the most stable P2P TV streams around but unfortunately, most of the channels are in listed in Chinese and there’s virtually no way of navigating what’s on unless you know the language. Sopcast on the other hand is mainly dominated by channels that are at least labelled in English (albeit badly such as the intriguingly titled “Man & Woman Romance Epic”!!). The annoying thing however is that it seems not many of the channels are ever streaming (including the aforementioned epic I might add). Click on any channel on TVAnts and you’re at least guaranteed something will appear even if you don’t understand it. Read the rest of this entry »

Working as software reviewer means that you have to install at least twenty new apps every week and uninstall them again as soon as you’re done with your analysis. However we all know how unhealthy this habit is for Windows, so using a virtual environment is almost compulsory. Virtual operating systems provide you with a safe sandbox where you can test as many programs without affecting the host system. What’s more, they usually feature an easy way to rid of a slow, app-ridden Windows and get a fresh, brand-new installation in a couple of clicks.

Among the several virtualization apps available today, I’ve tried VMware Player and VirtualBox. Though I’ve used the latter only for a few weeks now, I already found some interesting similarities – and its corresponding differences – between both programs that I thought would be worth pointing out.

Both VMware Player and VirtualBox are free apps, which is always a good point for a start. However VMware Player is more limited, because it doesn’t allow you to create new images (i.e. virtual operating systems) while VirtualBox does. If you want to create new images for VMware Player, you’ll have to upgrade to the more pricey Workstation version.

As for general performance, I find VMware Player to be more stable than VirtualBox. The first one usually runs very smoothly – except for the odd blue screen of death – while the second one has often shown a blank screen on my virtual machine, which means the system is frozen and you need to restart. Besides this stability issue, the truth is that VirtualBox is lighter on resources than VMware Player, making it easier to work with the host and guest systems in parallel. Relating to this, VirtualBox also features a really handy tool you don’t find in VMware Player: the possibility to “pause” the virtual machine, so that a good percentage of processor power and memory are released and you can then run heavy apps like Photoshop with no further hassle.

Regarding usability, both programs have their own pros and cons. On the one hand, VMware Player supports shared folders and also lets you directly drag and drop files between both the guest and host systems, while VirtualBox only works with shared folders that you need to configure before running the program. Keyboard and mouse swapping between the guest and host machines is generally more intuitive in VMware Player, whereas VirtualBox requires you to press a hotkey. Also, copying and pasting between the two operating systems works for VMware Player, but not for VirtualBox. On the other hand, VirtualBox enables you to create the so called snapshots, which let you restore the system to a previous state at any time. This comes in really handy when the image is not working properly and you can’t bother to create a new one: simply restore it to a previous fully working snapshot and you’re done.

In general terms, I’d say VMware Player is more intended to heavy users who need a reliable, powerful virtual environment to test software or try new operating systems, while VirtualBox seems to be more focused on not so techie people, who only want to test new apps in a safe environment without compromising the integrity of their computers. Now it’s your turn to try them and make up your mind.

Ok, so we’re still in the middle of summer, so why would I want to talk about research papers? True, it’s not the most exciting of topics at this time of the year, but unfortunately it’s what many scholars around the world are working on right now. You may have a deadline and the important thing is to reach it with your paper completed.

Although you’ll probably find less specialized applications on Mac than on Windows, I’ve noticed three excellent applications that not only help you handle your references, but also search and organize your papers and journals. These are, in no particular order, Sente, Papers and Reference Tracker. For those of you looking for quality Mac applications to help you out on your research paper, here is a look at each application’s notable features:

• Sente - I really like this reference manager. It has an iTunes-like structure to store and organize your papers in smart folders. The search function lets you reach numerous university library catalogs, PubMed and the Web of Knowledge. Sente also lets you download and search PDFs and has a great tool to insert citations into any word processor.
• Papers - Very similar to Sente, in that it offers the same sort of interface and structure. Papers lets you search through dozens of specified search engines for scholars such as ACS Portal or Citeseer. The multi-tabbed interface is great to keep more than one journals open at once and you have quick access to discussion panels from the right of the interface.
• Reference Tracker - Probably not as complete as the other two, Reference Tracker is still a very good program to handle your references.  The app keeps all your citations stored in the Harvard formatted list style and includes ISBN lookup and Amazon search. Handy if you are starting to lose count of all the references for your research paper.

What’s the best BitTorrent client for Mac? On Softonic it seems the favorite is still Azureus. I like Azureus, especially because it has so much statistics and features that you can go and tweak for hours. Still, I think it’s pretty resource intensive and probably not the friendliest torrent client for somebody who’s new to downloading. You can go with the basic BitTorrent client, but why when there are better ones around? Two highly popular alternatives are Tomato Torrent and Transmission. Let’s see how they compare to each other.

First up, Tomato Torrent. On start up this client doesn’t look like your usual BitTorrent client, as it shows a starting point window, where you get to choose different actions depending on whether you’re downloading or serving torrents. Even after you’ve launched a torrent you’ll have to get accustomed to it, as Tomato Torrent only displays the selected torrent with its own options and status.

You can adjust the different settings, like the number of incoming connections and upload maximums and minimums individually. Once a download is started you’ll see a progress bar, including percentage and status detail, like the download rate or the number of peers and seeds. From the preferences menu you can set how Tomato Torrent automatically stops completed torrents: according to time, percentage or amount of data. You can also choose the default maximum upload rate and have it automatically changed when finished.

Transmission has a more common interface, similar to most download managers, which shows all your torrents in a list. Torrents can be viewed in five different ways: all, active, downloading, seeding and paused. Transmission automatically shows upload and download rates and it includes a search box to find torrents more quickly. You can pause and resume downloads any time and add colored labels to them.

In the preferences you’ll see you can set download and upload limits. Even better is the speed limit mode, which overrides total bandwidth limits. This comes in handy if you don’t want Transmission hogging your connection. Speed limit can be scheduled during the day. Similarly you can set limits to the number of global connections and connections for new transfers. Even better, Transmission lets you prefer encrypted peers and block bad ones.

My personal preference goes to Transmission, as I find it very easy to use, yet fitted with just the right set of features, like encryption or speed limit. It’s simple yet complete. Tomato Torrent is a bit more basic, but it has a step through feel that makes a good choice for first time downloaders. Nothing can really go wrong with Tomato Torrent, as the application takes you through the downloading process all the way. After that, the choice is yours.

If you’re a Twitter fan then you’ll know that it’s not particularly well integrated with your desktop. However, there are two very simple solutions which can transform the way you use twitter - Twhirl and TwitterFox. Thanks to Adobe Air, you can now integrate twitter with your desktop much more easily courtesy of twhirl? By doing so, you can keep your status constantly updated quicker, improve your communication options and even change the look of twitter. In particular, it makes adding new friends much quicker and easier than in Twitter’s standalone version. In addition, this is a cross platform Twitter extension that works on both Windows and Mac and connects to multiple twitter and Friendfeed accounts. It provides instant desktop notification of new tweets and even allows you to post images to TwitPic. Also useful is the fact that if you’ve been pestered or bothered by either spam twitters or just someone really annoying, the most recent version also allows you to block other users. The tricky part is configuring it though - if it’s not done correctly, you run the risk of being stuck with old tweets every time you log in and being frozen out of twhirl occasionally although there is a very good user forum to seek help in. Keep track of the latest releases and developments on the twhirl blog.

However, the big downside of twhirl is that it requires installation of Adobe Air. In my opinion, it’s worth doing this although if you’re working a low spec machine, then it may be wise to avoid it. If this is your case, then you’d be much better seeking a lightweight solution in the form of TwitterFox. TwitterFox allows you to enjoy similar advantages to twhirl but the difference is that it simply plugs into Firefox. TwitterFox sits on your Firefox status bar for instant access to your friends and status changes. However, you can’t block contacts or post images like you can with twhirl although on the upside, it requires virtually no configuration whatsoever. One other minor criticism is that as you type, TwitterFox counts up to 140 characters rather than counting down which would be much more helpful because you always have to remember not to go over the 140 twitter character limit.

In summary, there’s probably little doubt that twhirl offers you more functionality than TwitterFox. However, it also requires more configuration and you’ll probably experience quite a few teething problems setting it up. If you’re just looking for a little better integration with your desktop and are working on a slow machine, go for TwitterFox. If you’re a serious twitter user, then you should definitely give twhirl a whirl.

I don’t think many people would dispute the claim that Photoshop is the best desktop photo editing suite out there. Likewise, most people would agree that it’s probably too expensive for the average home computer user. Things are changing though, and there are now a number of viable alternatives to the Adobe package that won’t cost you a penny. In the open source world, projects such as The GIMP and Paint.NET have brought huge graphic manipulation capabilities into the hands of those who cannot afford Photoshop (and who are honorable enough not to download an illegal version).

Things are getting even better too, thanks to the ongoing development of some geniunely powerful online image editing tools. Besides being free, the advantage these Web apps give you is that you can access your projects from anywhere and collaborate with others more easily. I’ve tried three of the most popular ones and here’s what I thought:

• Picnik - Users of Flickr will be familiar with this one, as it’s included as the default image tweaker with all accounts. Don’t worry if you don’t have a Flickr account because you can sign up for free with Picnik and it only takes a few seconds. The first thing that will strike you about this app is its drop-dead gorgeous interface. The quirky green background and translucent tabs make it a joy to work in, and it’s pretty easy to get around too.You can load images into the editor from a variety of sources, including by browsing to your hard drive, entering a URL to the picture, and even directly accessing your Facebook, Flickr or MySpace accounts. Clicking the ‘Edit’ tab will then present you with the main editing interface, which includes basic tweaking tools such as auto-fix, crop, resize, exposure, red-eye removal, etc. Click the ‘Create’ tab and you’ll be able to preview and apply one of a variety of effects to your pictures, as well as inserting text and shapes. Picnik has some pretty decent output options, with the ability to save to one of six formats (including to PDF) and a facility for adjusting the image dimensions.

  On the whole I was very impressed with the design of the Picnik application and it’s very intuitive to use. Unfortunately though, the free version of the service doesn’t include options such as full-screen mode, unlimited photo history, or anything in the way of advanced editing features, such as layer support or drawing tools. Read the rest of this entry »

Even though up till now all my pictures have been stored in iPhoto, I’ve gotten to a point where I can’t stand working with the application anymore. I find it too slow and too limited in terms of editing. I’m also not satisfied with the way you can organize and store your photos. The easiest solution would simply be to switch to Adobe Lightroom or Apple Aperture, but I’m waiting for a new Mac to do that. This is why I’ve gotten around to using Adobe Bridge, until I choose a more advanced solution. Now Adobe Bridge is never meant to replace any of the previously mentioned photo management apps. It doesn’t store pictures, but only displays them in multiple ways. As the name mentions, it also works as a bridge with all other Adobe applications, and you can quickly access specific functions in them, like merging to HDR in Adobe Photoshop.

I’m not ready to export all my pictures from iPhoto and save them in new folders in the Pictures folder of my Mac, so is there a way for Adobe Bridge and iPhoto to coexist? You can try but it is a little risky. The iPhoto library is a little complex and you can easily get lost in it. To access pictures stored in iPhoto, go to Library>Pictures>iPhoto Library and choose the folder with the date the pictures were taken at. If that doesn’t work you can also try this way. One thing to get right though is to select the correct pictures to edit.

As this forum discussion does well to explain, iPhoto saves photos in three folders: Originals, Modified and Data. Originals stores all the pictures imported from your camera, Modified has the pictures with your edits done in iPhoto, such as cropping or rotating, and Data contains thumbnails. Depending on how you work, you’ll choose to work with either the originals or modified, but try to stay consistent, or you’ll end up not knowing which ones are which. I prefer only working on the modified photos, that way I always keep the originals (for backup reasons), and they also already include any changes done in iPhoto. One really important thing to keep in mind though is to never, ever, move or delete pictures from your iPhoto libraries. You’ll risk messing up the iPhoto library structure and losing pictures.

Ultimately though, to the question, can you work with both iPhoto and Adobe Bridge, I’d say no. As said before the iPhoto library structure is complex and you’ll end up corrupting it. If you’ve gotten to this point, you’re simply better off switching to Adobe Lightroom or Apple Aperture in the long run. If like me you can’t do that for now, you’re safer choosing between iPhoto or Adobe Bridge. I’m choosing Bridge. In the future, we’ll compare how to import pictures from iPhoto to Lightroom and Aperture and choose which one is easier.

Two of the biggest TV apps out there are Joost - from the makers of Skype - and Miro which was formerly known as Democracy Player. Both have their hardcore supporters and denouncers and both have their pros and cons. Although I was initially impressed with Joost - surely one of the best attempts at offering a dedicated scheduled Internet TV service yet - I’ve gravitated back to Miro and here is why.

Miro is open source which immediately curries more favour with certain sectors of the IT savvy crowd. It can be modified and improved by its users while Joost is a closed source program that only the makers can improve. Miro offers thousands of channels from around the world which is way more than Joost although the disadvantage is that none of it is programmed or scheduled. In others words, you have to make your own programming schedule whereas with Joost, you can sit back, relax and enjoy the show. The problem is, if you’re not interested in watching such things as the Nelly Furtado channel, your options are more limited (although I think the documentary channels are pretty good). In essence, Miro is a far more democratic media player than Joost, allowing users to choose and stream channels from whatever source they wish and even create their own content. However, as I say, if you’re more interested in just vegging out than getting interactive, you’ll prefer Joost.

The other major two major aspects of Miro that appeal to me are that you can subscribe to channels with RSS feeds and save broadcasts. I don’t always want to tune in to see what’s on but viewing a feed is a far simpler and convenient solution. And since I can record programs on TV with my Video or DVD player, then I should have every right to do the same on my PC media players which Miro allows you to do no problems.

From a usability perspective, Miro also wins me. Joost is much more commercial in comparison, bloated with Flash graphics, buttons and worst of all, advertisements. Although the ads are minimal in Joost at the moment, they are sure to increase as the audiences go up.

I don’t want to come across as an open source fanatic but on balance and for my needs, Miro comes out on top. However, Joost is still very much a work in progress and in some ways, different anyway because if offers a programmed schedule of viewing. Maybe if it combines the best of both one day, I’ll start using it more regularly again.

Enjoying movies is no longer limited to sitting in your front room in front of a VCR or DVD player. Nowadays, most new mobile phones have the capacity for handling video, meaning that you can watch your favourite Simpsons episodes or the latest Bond film on the bus. With phone manufacturers getting even more generous with storage space, mobile video is now very much a reality.

But how to playback those movies? One of the most downloaded media players to date is the Nokia Multimedia Player, though it’s likely the program’s popularity owes more to the strength of the Finnish firm’s brand rather than a reflection of the quality of the software. The player is basic to say the least (there’s not even a fast-forward function) and the interface is pretty ugly. The application can handle the playback of MMS messages though and it supports a wide range of file formats. Or at least that what the developer claims - many of those ’supported’ didn’t work with the player during out tests.

A more accomplished alternative for playing video on your Symbian phone is SmartMovie. The playback functions are much more advanced than those of its Nokia rival. Opening and running video is a much smoother process with SmartMovie, and it contains a wealth of tools for converting and scaling video so that it matches your phone’s specifications perfectly. Unfortunately, the program does have problems with certain formats, such as .mov, and you need to faff about with third-party codecs.

If your phone runs the Windows Mobile OS then get hold of the rather wonderful TCPMP, a free DivX player with a whole bunch of cool features. The program’s main screen is reminiscent of the multimedia programs that you’d find on your desktop computer, with options to change aspect ratio, zoom and volume as well as more advanced controls such as video speed (10% - 200%), video driver, audio preamp and more. Of course, all of these solutions are only as good at handling video as your current handset, so if you’re looking for a portable video player make sure you choose carefully when buying a new phone.

Web applications are big. Web applications are the future. No, wait, web applications are now. At least that’s what came out of this year’s AJAXWorld Conference, which took place from the 23rd to the 26th of September in Santa Clara. A Rubicon report released during the event even claimed that “some web apps are already spreading rapidly through the PC user base”. According to the report, of 2,000 US adults surveyed, 80% have already heard of web apps. Pretty impressive, no? But have they actually used them? Well, according to the Rubicon study, more than half have and 37% do use web apps regularly. While the most popular apps tend to revolve around email or games, the Rubicon report writes that the real reason for not switching to web apps is lack of necessity. I think this will change though, as we’re seeing really impressive web apps being developed, often much more effective than any desktop program.

You might not know how to set up web apps on your desktop. Luckily there’s a few excellent applications out there to not only enjoy web applications but even develop some your self. Adobe Integrated Runtime, also known as AIR, is probably the most famous of them all. This cross platform application lets you develop web apps in most known coding languages and run them directly on your desktop. To counter it Microsoft released Silverlight, which works as a plug-in for your browser. Once installed, you don’t need to worry about launching it, as it activates automatically every time you come upon a web applications whilst browsing. Google itself is working hard at making web apps accessible on your desktop. Google Gears is a perfect example of this. This program allows you to consult Google services like Gmail or Google Reader from your computer even when you’re offline. If you develop applications, we also suggest installing the Google Web Toolkit, with which you can develop and debug AJAX apps. Last but not least is Mozilla’s WebRunner, a little curiosity I came across today. This application loads web apps into a separate basic browser window. Simple, but it works.

Any comic book-collecting uber-geek, will tell you the Marvel and DC comic books are completely different, in terms of their characters, style, moral values, etc. They will probably also tell you that Marvel and DC are like two brands like Pepsi and Coke and you can’t like both. Let’s face it, these people may know a lot about comics but they don’t know how to have fun. So, let me, Downloadman explain how you can enjoy the best of Marvel and DC superheroes from your PC.

Let’s start with a desktop theme featuring the very first comic book star, Superman. The pack includes a host of goodies from Mr Man’s last movie, including a wallpaper, resampled sounds, and a screensaver with widescreen images taken from the DVD. DC’s other heavyweight do-gooder is Batman, and Softonic has cool desktop adornements for both Batman Begins and the eagerly anticipated Dark Knight.

In the other corner, is the Marvel crew and I reckon they could easily take the DC lot in a fight. Want proof? Well check out the official X-Men game, which showcases some of the hardest dudes you’ll ever meet. Better still, you get to be them. Of course, everyone’s favourite Marvel hero is Spiderman (ironic, considering most people hate spiders) and there are a couple of great downloads for any fan. The first is called Bouncing Spiderman and is a screensaver where Spidey covorts around your desktop, and the second is the new Spideman: Friend or Foe game, where the friendly neighbourhood fellow joins forces with some of his arch rivals to kick some alien butt in NY.

However, probably my favourite comic book download is the Marvel Trading Card Game, where you get to match different superheroes against each other in order to win cards. It’s a real hoot and you can even play against other comic book fans online. Just don’t get them started on DC.

If you haven’t got your own blog yet then, quite frankly, you’re a loser. Actually, I haven’t got one and I fear that my usual excuse (that I’m an ‘outdoorsy type,’ who doesn’t want to sit around on a PC all day) won’t wash anymore. That’s because it’s becoming increasingly easy to set up and manage a blog from your mobile phone. The scope for mobile blogging has been affirmed by the fact that Movable Type and TypePad have just announced their own plug-ins for the iPhone.

If you want to get into ‘moblogging’ then you’ll have to choose the right application. The best options for us mortals without an iPhone are the Nokia-owned Lifeblog, and the rather excellent SplashBlog. The former of the two is very easy to manage because it automatically builds an organic timeline as you take photos and videos and send and receive messages. After quickly scrolling through these images and events you can save them to a ‘Favorites’ timeline for rapid access.

Youn then need to sign up with the TypePad service, from where you can access your LifeBlog timeline, pick and and choose the images or messages you want to add, insert some text and publish to your blog.

SplashBlog works in a very similar way, only it allows you to work directly within a web interface. The basic layout of the interface makes it easy to find your way around and the app makes clever use of hotkeys, meaning that posting a photo or blog entry is only ever a few clicks away. The range of features within SplashBlog is arguably greater than LifeBlog but ultimately it suffers from the same problem, in that it can take ages to upload content to your blog. Even a fairly low-res picture can take about 10 seconds to put onto a page, and until mobile operators furnish us with more bandwidth, moblogging will be a pursuit only for hobbyists and casual bloggers. Maybe I’ll wait ’til next year then.