Symantec today opened the first beta of its GoEverywhere service, a browser-accessible cloud workspace that centralizes user data from a variety of cloud services and makes them available through a single interface and single user ID and password. GoEverywhere features more than 100 of the popular communications and productivity apps available on the Web today, and it could be described as something of a cloud-based virtual machine. Interested users can sign up on goeverywhere.com to participate in the free beta.

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Systemax Inc, the company which owns TigerDirect, purchased nearly defunct computer retailer CompUSA's remaining assets at the beginning of the month in January 2008. The acquisition swept up the remaining CompUSA stores (around 16 of the formerly 104) and the ever-important brand name into Systemax's portfolio.

However ironically, CompUSA this morning issued a press release offering shopping tips "in light of recent big box electronics store closings," which cautioned consumers not to succumb to the pressure of buying from "disorganized sales" because of their closeout prices.

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Over the weekend, a proof of concept and downloadable demos for multi-touch on the Android open source mobile operating system were made available to the community.

In the time that I've been an Android user and owner of the HTC/T-Mobile G1, I've seen one thing happen dozens of times: when people ask to play with my phone, one of the first things they do is open the browser and try the iPhone "screen pinch." I don't know why, but it has happened literally dozens of times. Work and social colleagues, strangers, male, female, young and old, from the random people sitting next to me in airports to BlackBerry-faithful family members, almost everyone does it.

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Apple's iLife '09 creativity suite will be released tomorrow, according to the company. The software package will include updates to the iPhoto, iMovie, GarageBand, iWeb, and IDVD products made famous for being pre-installed on Macs.

iMovie '09 received the a new Precision Editor mode, video stabilization, animated travel maps and improved drag and drop functionality. iPhoto '09 now recognizes GPS tags, face detection and face recognition technologies for improved indexing of photos. GarageBand '09 has added instruction modes with 18 lessons on how to play piano and guitar, bolstered by the star power of Sara Bareilles, John Fogerty, Norah Jones, and Sting.

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Sprint this morning became the first of the major US telecommunications companies to announce layoffs brought about by recent economic conditions. The third largest provider said up to 8,000 jobs will be eliminated to reduce labor and operating expenses.

Additionally, the company said it has frozen 2009 salaries and 401(k) matching bonuses. The measures are expected to cost Sprint $300 million in the first quarter of 2009, but reduce operating costs by an annual $1.2 billion.

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Google has been steadily shrinking the number of users it lets access a business' free Google Apps account. When the service first launched, it allowed up to 200 users per business. Then, Google announced its $50 per-user premier platform and the the user limit on free accounts was reduced to 100. Now, Techcrunch reports that the number has shrunk yet again, hitting the 50 mark. Google says there are over 1 million businesses using Google Apps for their collaborative online workspace.

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Sharpcast began rolling out the 1.5 version of its cross-platform synching service SugarSync today. The upgrade includes the new "shared folders" feature, which adds a document collaboration aspect to the nearly one-year old sync service.

SugarSync is a subscription cloud service that makes documents and files remotely accessible through synched Windows and Mac PCs or through mobile handsets including iPhone and BlackBerry. Current subscribers may not receive the SugarSync Manager upgrade until Monday or Tuesday, but the shared folders feature in the Web interface is available to all immediately.

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Adobe Labs has made Photoshop Lightroom 2.3 and Photoshop Camera Raw 5.3 release candidates available for download. Both release candidates provide additional raw file support for the Nikon D3X and Olympus E-30 cameras. Lightroom 2.3 also fixes a memory leak that was discovered in the 2.2 release.

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Yesterday, HTC officially unveiled the updated Touch Cruise that had leaked to the Web as "Lolita." Pushed more as an update rather than a full-blown new phone, the new Touch Cruise features many of the same features found in AT&T's Fuze, and the previous Cruise model.

Connectivity is WCDMA/HSPA: 900/2100 MHz, HSDPA 7.2 Mbps, and then there's the requisite 802.11b/g, Bluetooth 2.0, and GPS/A-GPS. The operating system is once again Windows Mobile 6.1 with HTC's TouchFlo interface, but the noteworthy inclusion this time is the new HTC Footprints.

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MSN Mobile Music, a browser-based music shop designed for mobile handsets and completely unrelated to Zune marketplace was formally launched in the UK this week. Microsoft may have taken a step backward by protecting downloads with DRM.

The store is run by VidZone Digital Media and features .WMA downloads, ringtones, and video content from three of the "big four" major labels (Universal Music Group is not yet in.) Single songs cost £1.50, videos cost £2 and ringtones go for £3.

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Today, Google and YouTube announced the launch of www.youtube.com/vatican, the YouTube channel dedicated to the activities of the Pope and events in the smallest state in the world, Vatican City.

Footage on the channel comes from Centro Televisio Vaticano (CTV) and Vatican Radio (RV), so the primary language is Italian, but there will be information in Spanish, English, and German as well.

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Like the majority of its fellow electronics companies this week, Samsung today posted a loss for the fourth quarter of 2008.

The South Korean CE maker renowned for its displays and responsible for the much of the growth in the flash memory market lost $14.4 million for the quarter ending on New Year's Eve.

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A hotly-rumored branch of updates to the Android operating system that goes by the unusual moniker "cupcake" may not be released to the public.

AndroidTapp received a message from the T-Mobile Forums admin which was traced all the way back to Google via T-Mobile's Product Development and PR departments. In the message it said, "According to the Android team, "Cupcake," which is the code name for an Android software build, is still a work in progress that is considered to be a development branch and not for general availability."

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The DHS' US-CERT (Computer Emergency Readiness Team) released a security alert yesterday that disabling Autorun in Windows, an action meant to stanch the spread of the Downadup virus, is actually a vulnerability itself.

The Downadup worm has reached epidemic proportions (meaning, I have begun to overhear conversations between elderly women talking about it). But an announcement from US-CERT this week says that one of the remedies to the problem, a registry fix that disables Autorun, is unsound.

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Earlier this week, TorrentFreak said the upcoming Myka BitTorrent set-top box looks like a scam after the company purported to be on schedule to ship the box in four to six weeks. Betanews sought clarification.

The Myka set-top box promises to deliver a BitTorrent experience on TV via a Linux-based OS. With 80, 160, and 500 GB HDDs, the unit features HDMI, S-Video, SPDIF and composite outs, and is slated to cost between $300 and $450.

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