Ookla Net Metrics' free network speed test speedtest.net is so widely used that even the federal government has recognized it as a reliable tool for measuring wireless network conditions. Friday, the company published results of some 57,000 user-initiated iPhone speedtests in the U.S., which showed users on the AT&T network getting average speeds substantially higher than iPhone users on Verizon Wireless.

After publishing the data, the story got some good coverage pitting iPhone against iPhone. But it should have come as no surprise to anyone who knows wireless technologies that HSPA was faster than EV-DO rev. A. On paper, HSPA's theoretical max speed is 7.2 Mbps, and EV-DO rev. A's is only 3.1 Mbps. It's pretty widely accepted.

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There are close to 90 different tablets announced for 2011 delivery. Some of the hottest models, like the Motorola XOOM, are weeks away from availability. Meanwhile, hype continues as fervently as ever about iPad 2. In such a competitive market, with overwhelming number of choices, there are going to be losers -- and lots of them. Is there a formula for success?

Earlier today, I asked Stephen Baker, NPD's vice president of industry analysis, three things tablet manufacturers/retailers need do to be successful. One of the three I most expected didn't make the list (more on that later). Baker is unusual among industry analysts for his no-nonsense common sense about retail. Tablets aren't just tactile in how they're used. People will want to touch and hold them before buying them, which means retail distribution. Besides something new needs to be seen before purchasing; it's retail marketing 101 stuff.

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Kenyan coder John Paul Chacha has made his Chasys Draw IES image suite completely free with its latest release, creating a rival to other popular free image-editing tools such as Paint.NET and The GIMP. Chasys Draw IES consists of four components, the main being Chasys Draw Artist, a full image editor with powerful feature set. There's also an image viewer (Chasys Draw Viewer), batch conversion tool (Chasys Draw Converter) and tool for processing RAW digital camera image files (Chasys Draw raw-Photo).

Chasys Draw Artist is a fully functional image editor, with a powerful set of features to rival both commercial and other free applications. It promises a radically different approach to image editing, and is also capable of creating images, icons, CD labels and other useful designs.

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Popular microblog Twitter has blocked third-party mobile Twitter apps Twidroyd and UberTwitter on Friday, citing unspecified policy violations.

"Every day, we suspend hundreds of applications that are in violation of our policies," the Twitter Help Center blog said Friday. "Generally, these apps are used by a small number of users. We are taking the unusual step of sharing this with you because today's suspension may affect a larger number of users."

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Make no mistake, smartphones and tablets are disrupting typical PC behavior. The real question: Will changing behavior slow PC sales? It's among the questions to ask, following the release earlier today of NPD report "Evolving Technology Trends: PC Activities on Non-PC Devices."

According to NPD, about 35 percent of US smartphone owners use email less on their PC now. Similarly, about 30 percent of US tablet owners say they email and browse the Internet less on the PC; 28 percent don't use PC social networking services as much. Welcome to the post-PC era, or at least it's beginnings.

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Opera software has taken a cue from Ubuntu and will be giving its browser builds "more exciting" public code names starting this year. Thursday evening, the company released a snapshot of the browser formerly known as Opera 11.10, now known simply as "Barracuda."

This version updates the browser core to version 2.8.99, which adds the implementation of the Web Open Font Format (WOFF) to the browser's current list of supported web font formats which includes: TrueType/OpenType TT fonts (.ttf), OpenType PS fonts (.otf) and SVG.

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When Google's Chrome browser moves up the ladder in the public beta channel, the dev channel gets an upgrade too, but a full generation ahead of what the public is playing with. So with Chrome 10 beta now available in public beta, the Chrome 11 developer beta (11.0.672.2) can now be downloaded as well.

Download Chrome 11 in Fileforum now!

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Late yesterday, Google released the latest beta of Chrome, version 10, celebrating the move to double figures with some very interesting new features. Google has kept Chrome development at breakneck pace since the first beta released in September 2008. Chrome revved from v4 to v8 in 2010. The v10 beta release comes days after Microsoft's Internet Explorer 9 Release Candidate 1 topped 2 million downloads.

According to a Google blog post, Chrome 10's new Crankshaft version of its V8 JavaScript engine now runs scripts some 66 percent faster than previous versions, as measured by the V8 benchmark suite. The new beta build also includes hardware-accelerated video, which Google says may cut CPU usage by as much as 80 percent when running full-screen, assisting performance generally and extending your battery life.

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How safe are you online? These days the biggest prize for any hacker or thief is access to your online accounts -- financial or otherwise, and with many people choosing to protect all their online details with a single, easily crackable password, there's never been a better time to practice safe browsing.

The problem with staying safe is that ideally you should use complicated, unique passwords for every single account you have. That's brilliant in theory, but in practice it's almost impossible to remember that "fjdSkjAh43q2" is the password for your online bank while "rh13um93ba" protects your Paypal account. The answer lies in utilizing a password manager like one of the five we've plucked out from a lineup for this quick-fire comparison.

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The 2010s are rapidly shaping up to be like the 1990s, but with smartphones replacing PCs as the objects of want. This week's Mobile World Congress buzzed with excitement that felt like Comdex 1995. The next day's hottest device announcement eclipsed the day's before. Single-core processor today is obsolete to tomorrow's dual-core, which is outdated a day later by quad-core -- or that's how it feels.

Things are changing so fast, some manufacturers can only keep up by announcing the next big thing. Yesterday, veteran Mac journalist Jim Dalrymple chided Research in Motion: "Shut up and ship." He observed that RIM talks lots about new tablets -- "that's three generations of PlayBook tablets announced in five months, and we still haven't seen a single product make it to market." The excitement about mobile devices and pace that faster phones are shipping and new applications releasing are among the many reasons that last week I asserted: "The PC era is over." To be clear: Change of eras doesn't mean the end of the PC just its rapidly decreasing relevance before cloud-connected devices.

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Google is committing further to social search, and said Thursday that it would more tightly integrate results from its users' social circles. The Mountain View, Calif. search company first introduced the functionality two years ago in an effort to make results more personally relevant.

"As always, we want to help you find the most relevant answers among the billions of interconnected pages on the web," the company said in a blog post introducing the changes. "But relevance isn't just about pages -- it's also about relationships."

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Corporate security is serious business, but what about small businesses? How do owners know if they're unconsciously leaving the backdoor open to cybercriminals? Monitoring for new and emerging threats is a daunting task, particularly when the small business owner wears a second hat -- IT manager. Cyberattacks come through a variety of channels. There are five backdoor entrances every small business should guard against.

Door #1: Social networks and community bad spirits. Most social networking activity is concerned with community spirit and sharing of a wide range of data including documents, music, video and links. The biggest problem here is trust. People trust people that they know, or that they think they know. This means that users are more likely to click an infected link if it comes from a trusted colleague or friend. Beef up your security policy. Only 23 percent of companies have any security policies in place that specifically addresses social media. Offer staff some guidelines to keep them and your company network safe.

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Thursday, the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) released The National Broadband map, a staggeringly powerful free tool that gives anyone access to census-level data about broadband connectivity in the United States.

The map, which cost roughly $200 million to build, includes data from more than 25 million records, showing what types of broadband are available in all of the 50 U.S. states (FTTH, Docsis 3.0, Cable, DSL, Mobile, etc.), which companies provide service (and thusly where regional monopolies exist,) and the maximum advertised speeds. Users can then filter data by region, state, city, county, district, block, or even street address, or by regional and household demographic information. This data can then be plugged into the map's "analysis" feature, and compared with data from other areas.

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Late yesterday I asked: "Would you pay $600 for the Motorola XOOM tablet?" Whoa, did you respond. Reaction is mixed, but those of you who own Android phones, particularly Motorola models, are more likely to answer "Yes." However, plenty of readers still wouldn't pay $600 -- for any tablet, and that includes Apple's iPad.

Quick recap: It turns out that earlier leaks about XOOM costing 800 bucks were true. That's for a model with 3G/4G radios and WiFi. Yesterday, Motorola revealed that a WiFi-only model would be available for only $600. Betanews readers reacted quiet negatively to $800 XOOM. So what about 600 bucks?

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The weakest link in any security strategy is human. No matter how good the technology, nothing creates risk like ignorance and naiveté. When Symantec released its Norton 2011 products back in September, the company spoke of "engendering goodwill" among potential customers with free tools to educate and protect their vulnerable systems. Today, concurrent with the release of Norton 360 version 5, the company made available yet another free tool to keep users aware of the ever-changing daily threat landscape.

The Norton Cybercrime Index, a free service, gives a daily snapshot of the most dangerous websites and the most hijacked search terms, as well as top scams, identity theft ploys and spam. The daily data from the Cybercrime Index can be viewed in a Web portal, on a mobile site, or as a free desktop gadget for Windows 7 and Vista. The main tool is a daily risk level meter similar to the Department of Homeland Security's threat advisory level.

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