A rather fanciful and irresponsible commentary at Forbes today asserts Apple is looking for a new chief executive. "Some Wall Street sources close to some Apple executives say such a move is afoot", contributor Gene Marcial writes, without offering any more meaningful identification in that. What? Were the boys talking between toilet stalls again?

At the very best, his sources are second-hand. Hearsay. Regardless, replacing Tim Cook is the wrong solution because his management isn't the problem, nor should he be ousted simply because the stock is in freefall. The fruit-logo company is a money machine, enormous in his hands compared to predecessor Steve Jobs. What Cook lacks is what Jobs had: a chief operating officer. Apple needs to find one -- now -- and public COO search might even boost investor confidence, which lacking perplexes me, given how much money this company mints.

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For years, Tumblr CEO David Karp balked at running ads. But, hey, you can only run a free service on startup capital for so long. Karp caved in 2012, allowing sponsored posts on the website. Today Tumblr brings them to the mobile app. Click carefully.

The first one I see is for General Electronic. Surely there's some pithy wisecrack to be made about GE, because of "30 Rock" -- you know incorporating microwave ovens and other products into fictious "TGS with Tracy Jordan".

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jAlbum AB is released a new version of its cross-platform web media album builder for Windows, Mac and Linux. jAlbum 11.2 builds on version 11’s added support for embedding video clips as well as photos into web albums.

Version 11.2 allows users to include video without first processing it, adds play button for better identification and includes numerous bug fixes. It’s the third minor update to jAlbum in just 10 days, following on from builds 11.1 and 11.15.

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As we all recap the Boston bombing and manhunt events in our minds, looking for lessons learned, the one that sticks out in my head is the value of surveillance cameras. They were essential to catching the perpetrators and doing so quickly. More aggressive use of them might have resulted in even faster capture, and the civil rights and privacy concerns people express about them are hysterical overreaction.

The value of surveillance cameras was obvious almost immediately after the event. I remember many experts interviewed predicting that they would be used to narrow down suspects rather quickly. In fact, you don't need an expert to understand this. The only people who didn't seem to understand it well were the Tsarnaev brothers. They stayed in town and tried to go on with their lives, indicating that thought they wouldn't be detected. They must have freaked out when they saw their pictures on the news, but they still didn't get out of Dodge.

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While I tend to visit the Google site daily, it is not to conduct a search -- I can do that from the Omnibar in Chrome -- but to simply to see if there is a new Doodle. Perhaps a silly reason, but it only takes a couple of seconds and sometimes I am rewarded with a small bit of entertainment.

With today being Earth Day, which was first held on April 22nd 1970, I expected a nod from the search giant and I was not disappointed.

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Teasers are an effective way to get us all worked up over little or no specific details. "Is that a new design?" and "Who is this for?", accompanied by the obligatory "What is this?", are the sort of questions we ask ourselves when dealing with them.

One's thing's for certain -- no matter the product, from just a picture the company behind it sure gets a huge marketing boost among tech-savvy folks. And today Nokia tries to grab our attention with a teaser of its own. Spoiler alert -- it doesn't appear to be a high-end Lumia smartphone.

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Your privacy is Microsoft’s priority. At least that’s what the software giant is saying. According to Ryan Gavin, General Manager, Windows, the company takes its responsibilities for protecting your privacy very seriously.

To prove this, Microsoft is launching a new consumer awareness campaign focused on online privacy. There’s a special information and tools page at www.Microsoft.com/YourPrivacy (which is so private it doesn’t currently exist), and an ad campaign to "kick start awareness and conversation".

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Fifth in a series. I'll admit it -- Nokia was a company I couldn't care less about a couple of years ago. I disliked the design, the high price and the bulkiness of its high-end smartphones, which then ran Symbian. At the time the Finnish manufacturer had the accelerator pedal mashed to the floor and was heading straight on a highway to oblivion, seemingly unwilling to steer the ship in the right direction. Android and iOS were the future and Symbian was the past. Then Nokia jumped ship to Windows Phone.

And that made a difference. As I embraced Windows Phone as my smartphone operating system of choice something happened. Nokia became interesting and appealing to me, so much so that I even bought a Lumia 920 little more than a month ago. And, to be honest, I'd never thought that one day I would own and love a Nokia smartphone. There's something about the Lumia 920 which feels right and makes the Finnish manufacturer fit perfectly into the Windows Phone picture.

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Over five million businesses currently use Google Apps -- a number that is growing all the time -- and while getting to grips with the cloud-based productivity suite is fairly easy, there will always be some staff members who struggle.

Toronto-based Synergyse, a startup comprised of former Google employees, hopes to make it easy for everyone to get the most out of Google’s suite by providing training directly inside each application.

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IObit has released Advanced SystemCare Free 6.2.0, a minor update to its freeware system optimization and maintenance tool. The program, which can be upgraded to a Pro version with enhanced malware protection, deeper cleansing and automatic optimization, offers PC users a wide range of tools for maintaining, cleaning, optimizing and securing their computer.

Version 6.2 is a minor maintenance release that promises improvements across many of the program’s individual components. It also promises better compatibility with Windows 8.

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Consumers have a rich selection of services for TV and movie content: iTunes, Netflix, Hulu, and I'm sure there are more I'm forgetting. Some of these are tied to hardware (like iTunes) and others try to be agnostic in this regard.

My service of choice is Amazon Prime Instant Video. Amazon Prime is a $79 annual membership that gives you 2-day shipping on most items you buy from the retailer, allows you "to stream thousands of movies and TV shows" and access to the Kindle Lending Library with thousands of books.

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Even when they appear idle, PCs are forever buzzing with background activity, as Windows and application processes save data to log files, tweak Registry keys and carry out assorted other updates. Normally this can be safely ignored, but sometimes -- if you think you’ve just installed malware, say, and would like to check what it’s done -- then you might wonder what’s changed on your system in the past few minutes.

And that’s where DiffView comes in. If you want to find out more about recent activities on your PC, then you’ll first need to tell DiffView where you’d like it to scan. Clicking the Files tab reveals an Explorer-type view where you can select particular folders – \Windows, say, or \Program Files – while the Registry tab allows you to select a particular area of the Registry.

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Last night, I rushed off to the local mall intent on seeing movie "Oblivion", but the 6:45 p.m. show was sold out. So I walked around and spent time inside Apple and Microsoft retail shops. At Apple Store, I had two objectives: finding out the cost of replacing a shattered iPhone 5 screen (not available, refurb phone is $229 option) and observing how the company sells T-Mobile models alongside those from AT&T, Sprint and Verizon. Pink's unlocked phone costs less upfront compared to Blue, Red and Yellow and is financed for 24 months. Apple presents T-Mobile iPhone 5 as costing considerably more.

Apple Store provides product information on iPads, which is a subtle way of promoting the devices. The marketing page presents 16GB iPhone 5 as selling "from $199" for AT&T, Sprint and Verizon and "from $649" for T-Mobile, which is technically true but also misleading. The $199 represents the big three's upfront price. T-Mobile asks about half as much, $99.99, upfront. But Apple lists T-Mobile's price as $450 more. Who wants to pay $649 when the others charge $199?

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Gmail shows little sign of becoming any less popular, but any iOS user will find that dealing with a Gmail account on an Apple device is not the most pleasant experience. Mailbox was released to help address this fact and proved so popular that newcomers were greeted by a lengthy waiting list before they could get started. The app has now been updated in a number of key areas and, perhaps most importantly, anyone is free to jump right in and get started without the need to wait on a reservation list.

This is obviously great news for people who have been waiting to try out the app, but there is also plenty for existing users to take advantage of. One of the major standout features of the app from its inception was the way in which emails could be dealt with using little more than a swipe; swipe one way to delete or mark as read, and the other way to snooze.

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Microsoft continues to build and leak Windows Blue at a solid rate. Last month we toured build 9364, and now 9374 is out. There are plenty of rumors about where "Blue" is headed, including even, oh the horrors, bringing back the Start menu and adding a boot-to-Desktop option. With 9374 now out on the web (BN can not tell you where to find it, but I am sure you will stumble upon it if you look), I decided to see what changed.

Before we go any further, just for the record, this installation is 32-bit only and you will need to choose "Custom" when running setup -- an upgrade does not work. I installed in Virtual Box, and I recommend you use some sort of virtualization software as well. This leak is certainly not ready for prime time just yet.

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