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Sixth in a series. I'm a massive fan of the Broken Sword series of games, so this week was a great one for me as I finally got to download and start playing the brand new Broken Sword adventure on iOS. I'm pleased to report it doesn't disappoint. Thanks to mobile devices (and Kickstarter and Indiegogo campaigns) classic adventure series are getting a whole new lease of life, which is fantastic. Fans of classic games will be thrilled to know there's a "new" Final Fantasy game out this week too.

With the Winter Olympics upon us, Apple has gathered together a collection of official Sochi 2014 apps, including the Athletes’ Hub which is well worth a download.

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Having quality, official apps available, and frequently improving, for popular services is a key part in increasing Windows Phone's chances of breaking into market share double digits and, therefore, getting more developers to consider releasing their offerings in the Store.

While third-party alternatives have already proved to be viable options, it is clear by looking at the Store rankings that Windows Phone users have an undeniable craving for installing the real deal. Official apps lend more credence, after all, and are less likely to be removed without prior notice, unlike their unofficial counterparts. And this brings us to the Flickr app which Yahoo has officially admitted it no longer has any plans to update.

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Over 1000+ hours of live footage covering 98 Winter Olympics events, all being broadcasted over numerous digital and TV avenues -- simultaneously. As an infrastructure geek at heart, and someone who consults clients on their networks, I can't even fathom what kind of backbone is needed to stream a worldwide event like the Olympics. But NBC has fallen back on a familiar face in the cloud arena to make this magic happen: Microsoft.

NBC partnered with YouTube for the 2012 London Olympics and the experience for end users was less than ideal. Robert Cringely had some truthful words about his efforts to catch some footage, and even the NY Times published a scatching piece on the miserable pain that YouTube was putting users through with buffering times. YouTube may be one the most watched video services on the web today, but their secret sauce has traditionally been in handling statically uploaded footage. Live broadcasting is a whole different arena from the little I know about the media arena.

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The Galaxy S4 is approaching its one-year anniversary and, to keep things interesting before its successor arrives to take the helm, Samsung has announced a new Black Edition version of the popular Android smartphone. Not to leave the smaller mini out of the equation, the South Korean maker is also giving it the same makeover.

Black Edition makes me think of hardcore variants of Mercedes AMG cars, which usually offer more power on tap than the base models. However, this is not the case when it comes to the two new Galaxy S4 and Galaxy S4 mini trims that come without beefed up internals. Basically, what we are looking at here folks is smartphone plastic surgery.

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Piriform Software has released Defraggler 2.17 and Defraggler Portable 2.17, updated builds of its freeware defragmentation tool for Windows. Version 2.17’s main highlight is the addition of a new Statistics tab, alongside SSD optimizations and progress information being displayed via the program’s System tray icon.

The update also comes with the promise of various optimizations, performance tweaks and the usual slew of bug fixes and minor GUI improvements.

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Computers may be everywhere these days, but computer programming is still often seen in a very stereotypical way: it’s complicated, strictly for geeks only, not something of much use to anyone else.

The reality is very different. Anyone can learn the fundamentals of programming. It’s great for developing problem-solving skills, or just helping you understand how other applications work. And it’s really not that difficult, especially if you start with a simple language like the open source BASIC-256.

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Being the go-to tech support guy for my family and some friends usually means I am asked to do a clean install of the operating system and software on their PCs. It does not happen often, but when it does I make sure they are on the latest available versions. This is because there is a lesser chance of malware infections, and developers ensure updates for many years to come. (That being said, I have yet to subject them to Windows 8.x, but that day may come as well.)

Microsoft knows it has many customers who also provide tech support for friends and family, so the software giant is now urging them to move everyone they know away from Windows XP, as support for the old operating system is soon to end, by upgrading to Windows 8.1. In part, this is a sound piece of advice as there are still too many Windows XP users out there who may have to face massive problems due to the lack of software updates. (If my experience is of any indication, those who provide tech support may face massive headaches when attempting to fix those problems, but that is another story).

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With the Winter Olympics about to start there have been a number of stories pointing out the security risks of people using their mobile devices in Sochi.

Writing in a blog post, Paul Proctor, vice president and analyst at Gartner says it's important to remember that you're not really safe anywhere and it's your behavior that's the key factor in your security.

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Today is a big day in the sporting world, as we all look forward to the events that make up the sporting challenge known as the Winter Olympics. We are graced with these games every four years. Sadly, this year has been marred a bit, thanks solely to the venue hosting it. The 2014 Winter games take place in Sochi, Russia, a beautiful location for the challenge.

But Russia is less than beautiful when it comes to social standards. In fact, the country has proven itself to be downright backwards in its stance on human rights. The fact is, the country has a law banning gay activities. It really doesn't matter much if you are, or are not, a homosexual. The simple human rights issue should be fairly obvious here.

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A couple days ago, Asus unveiled its Chromebox. At the time, I called it sexy. While it is still attractive, it has already been upstaged.

Yes, today, Hewlett Packard releases a sexier, rounder device that arguably makes Acer's look plain and tired. Sadly, price and full specs are not yet known.

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The social network for professionals, LinkedIn, is to acquire Bright, a job-search site that matches employers with potential employees. This is a purchase that makes a lot of sense for LinkedIn, the Facebook of the working world, helping to make it even easier for people to connect across industries. While LinkedIn has around 11 years of experience under its belt, Bright is more a newcomer, having only launched three years ago.

It seems like a perfect pairing. LinkedIn members have their resumes online as part of their profiles. Bright makes use of resumes to link people to jobs. It just seems to make sense. The three year old site is being purchased for what LinkedIn describes as "approximately $120 million, subject to adjustment". This total comprises 73 percent stock and 27 percent cash. The deal is expected to conclude by the end of Q1 2014.

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There are OMG events, and Sony's selling its PC business surely is one of them.

"It's an historic moment", Roger Kay, Endpoint president, says. "The company Steve Jobs looked up to as the paragon of style leaves the industry he helped found, driven off, at least in part, by him".

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Actual, real-life meetings are just so passé! In fact I have hardly met up with any of the people I work with in person -- we are living in the digital age, man! But the likes of Skype and FaceTime show that there is still an interest, even a need, for virtual face-to-face time, and this is particularly true for businesses. Conference calls are easy to set up on the phone, but there are times when it really does help to see what’s going on at the other end. Today Google takes the wraps off its solution: Chromebox for meetings.

As you would expect from Google, and probably guess from the name, this is a box running ChromeOS. Powered by a 4th generation Intel Core i7 processor, there are four USB 3.0 ports as well as HDMI and DisplayPort++ connections, and network connectivity is provided by an Ethernet port as well as an 802.11 a/b/g/n WiFi adaptor. Also provided is an HD camera, a mic and speaker combo, and a remote control.

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It's been a scant few days since US Justice Department relented, somewhat, on the restrictions placed upon companies in regards to the secret court order to hand over the data of customers. The ruling opened things up a bit, but in the opinion of some, it failed to go far enough.

Now Twitter is standing up to the powers that be and speaking its mind. "[...] we think it is essential for companies to be able to disclose numbers of national security requests of all kinds -- including national security letters and different types of FISA court orders -- separately from reporting on all other requests", says Jeremy Kesel, the manager of Global Legal Policy for the social network.

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For someone looking to begin a Linux journey, quite often, the first leg of it involves Ubuntu. Sure, there are many other distributions, but none can match it in popularity or ease of use. While my personal preference is Fedora, I concede that Ubuntu is probably more suitable for the majority of desktop users.

Last year, despite its failed crowd funding campaign, Canonical managed to make waves by introducing the concept for an Ubuntu smartphone. Of course, no matter how great the device is on paper, if carriers don't support it, it is pretty much dead in the water. Today, the Ubuntu phone project gains an important ally in Vodafone.

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