The problems with all of those mediums is the overall lack of storage space, the hassle of lugging it all around and the security of keeping your files out of the hands of others. If you have your sensitive and personal files saved on a physical storage medium they will always be at risk of theft or misplacement, so physically storing your files is no longer the right option… I learned that the hard way as I not only had a CD wallet full of software and personal data CDs stolen out of my car but I also lost a thumb drive that fell off my key chain. The thumb drive was a huge scare as it was full of personal files including financial records, credit records and even a copy of my resume on it. Luckily I was smart enough to encrypt the files so nothing ever came about from it, but if a technically competent person found it they could have easily stolen my identity. 

So, there has to be a better way right? You’re right; there are quite a few ways thanks to the severe drop in cost of storage (1TB drive for $200!). Well, the answer for me at least is a gift from our friends in Redmond. SkyDrive is a free online storage and sharing system that is part of Microsoft’s Live family of products. For the cost of nothing Microsoft gives you 5GBs of online storage to do what you will with. The beauty of the service is you can obviously access it anywhere in the world that has an internet connection, they offer you a huge amount of storage, the site is incredibly easy to use and you can also make your files private or share them publicly with your friends, family and colleagues as needed.

I’d go through a step by step process of how to use the site if it was needed, but the system is so well put together that it is rather self-explanatory. If you want to add a file, hit he add file button. If you want to create a new folder, hit the create folder button. Public folders are obviously viewable by everyone. Shared folders are folders only those you choose can view. Private folders are just what they say they are… only viewable to you. If you use other Microsoft Live services such as Live Spaces, Live Events, Live Galleries or Hotmail then you’ll be happy to know that your SkyDrive is linked to all of those other services via a very slick and Vista-like design. So, ditch the floppies, CDRs and flash drives and take SkyDrive for a spin.

When you enter a search keyword or phrase (I of course first searched "Nine Inch Nails") Viewzi allows you to choose how you’d like to browse your results via a coverflow-like interface, including but not limited to:

01. MP3 Search View
02. Web Screenshot View
03. 4 Sources View (Ask, Google, MSN and Yahoo)
04. Video x3 View (BlinkX, Veoh and YouTube)
05. Basic Photo View (Flickr and Riya)
06. Simple Text View (Compete.com, Google and Yahoo)
07. Celebrity Photo View (Google Images and Just Jared)
08. Reuters News View
09. Everyday Shopping View (Amazon, Ebay, Target, Walmart)
10. The Weather View
11. TechCrunch (CrunchBase, TechCrunch)
12. Amazon Book View

It is pretty amazing; each one of the options above gives you a completely new way to view your results… the most impressive of which are the Video x3 and Celebrity Photo. With Video x3 the results are pulled from all three of the video sites and begin to auto play without sound in three rows, it is very impressive to see. With the Celebrity Photo View you can click and drag the photos around like you would if the pictures were printed out and laying on your coffee table… it makes searching actually fun. The Web Screenshot view will get a lot of use as well as you get a full preview of the page before actually going to it, so your back and forward browser buttons will probably get a lot less use now.

I could go on describing the other aspects for hours because they are all so intuitive, but I’ll leave the exploring up to you. Overall I think Viewzi has a bright future ahead of it… I doubt they’ll overtake Google but the site has great promise. It’ll be interesting to see how many of the different search result features catch on and how they evolve the current ones while thinking of even bigger and better ones down the road. I know I’ve spent the past few hours just toying around and extremely impressed with the design and ease of use. I can honestly say that I will continue to use this search as it helps me come across things I’d never noticed with a basic text result, hopefully people will give this technology a chance.

The site doesn’t actually go live until June 9th but via a promotion with Dallas’s CBS11TV Viewzi is offering a special promotion code for closed sine-up; simply enter referral code cbs11… I’d jump on the bandwagon quickly though as they make no mention of just how many signups they are allowing with the code; and with the news looking to hit Digg’s front page soon they may go very quickly over the next 12-24 hours. If for some reason you can’t get in on the closed preview or if you’d like to know more, head to Viewzi.TV where they have a handful of videos showing you the ropes.

Computer viruses and spyware are considered to be malware, which basically translates to “malicious software.” Malware are rogue software programs created and designed to infiltrate or damage a computer system without the owner’s informed consent. Anotherwords, they are written by bad guys to either get personal information and files from your computer, damage or corrupt your computer’s files or to simply hijack your system and it’s resources to perform malicious attacks on other computers. There are literally thousands of different types of malware so keeping track of all of them is impossible for your average Joe, so that’s where programs like AVG come in.

There are a lot of symptoms to help diagnose if your computer has contracted a virus or spyware and if you know where to look they aren’t hard to spot. Has your computer been running slower than usual lately? Do you get random popup ads when you aren’t even on the internet? Do your friends get random emails from your email account? Have some of your important files seemed to just vanish? Does your machine frequently lock up? The list of problems caused by malware goes on and on and instead of worrying about them all AVG can quickly and painlessly scan your computer and notify you of problems and fix them as needed. So, without further ado let’s get to it…

1. First thing’s first, head to the AVG Anti-Virus website so you can download the basic version absolutely free of charge. Once at the site choose the “Get it now” button from the left column labeled “free basic protection.” Follow through the next few clicks choosing the free version all the way through. Then download the .EXE file to a location you’ll remember such as your Desktop or My Documents folder.

2. Once your download completes double click the .EXE to begin the setup process. At the welcome message hit the next button. Now hit the accept button for both the acceptance notice and license agreement pages. The installer then quickly runs a check of your system and then prompts you for a standard or custom install, just use the standard option and hit next and then again at the free license option. Uncheck the box for the AVG toolbar as it is pretty useless and hit next and then finish. The setup will then install the files which may take a couple of minutes. Hit finish when it completes.

3. After the installation the AVG First Run Wizard begins, which is a shot 7 step proccess to configure AVG. Hit next for the first step.

4. The second step of the wizard is setting up the time your computer is scanned for viruses. Usually you’ll want to choose a time when you aren’t using your computer as the scan can be intensive and slow your machine’s performance. If you leave your computer on overnight then choose a time you’ll know you’ll be sleeping… in my case I’ll choose 2:00AM.

5. On the next page check the Yes box and choose next. Providing AVG with potentially malicious websites help them provide a better service, so please contribute… no information about you is passed along to them, just information regarding the bad websites.

6. The next step allows you to update the AVG software to the latest virus definitions, you’ll want to do this so your computer can be protected from the latest malware.

7. The next page shows the progress of the updates, click next once the updates complete.

8. The next page allows you to register with AVG and be notified of updates and specials, register if you’d like and continue on.

9. The final page of the wizard simply congratulates you on your complete installation and configuration. Hit finish.

10. Now you should see the AVG Anti-Virus logo on your task bar in the bottom right hand of your screen, by the clock. This means that AVG is running on and protecting your computer. It will automatically scan your computer every night (at the time you set earlier) for potential problems and prompt you to remedy them as needed.

11. If you’d like to bring up the AVG user interface manually you may do so by right clicking the AVG icon on your taskbar and choosing “Open AVG User Interface” or via the classic Start menu. The interface allows you to do things such as run a manual scan of your system, update to the latest virus definitions or view, change or disable various features… all of which are pretty self explanitory.

Well there you have it. You’ve not only installed the basic version of AVG Anti-Virus software but you’ve helped protect your computer and files from some nasty malware. Hopefully the process was quick and easy for you because this product will come in extremely handy and help be a buffer between your computer and personal files and the hackers of the world. Check back in the next day or so for even more free ways to protect your computer from the scum of the internet.

Just think about it, you no longer have to clog inboxes with 800 pictures of your sleeping toddler… now you can just send your friends your Picasa Web Album URL and call it a day. Trust me, they’ll thank you later. I know people who use social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace have a place to host their images but there is really something to be said for an actual web album site dedicated to being just that. Flickr is amazingly popular and a great site but to get the full experience you have to pay a monthly fee… why do that when Google gives you just as good an option for free?

So, you have Picasa installed and your images edited and looking pretty, your eight year old doesn’t look like the spawn of satan anymore thanks to that nifty red eye removal tool… and now you want to show the world (or just your friends). First thing is first, you need to sign up for a Picasa Web Albums account. The process is quick and painless and if you have a Gmail or Adsense account you can use the same login details. (note: you don’t have to use Picasa to use Picasa Web Albums or vice versa, they both can work together or alone).

1. Choose your desired username and enter your First and Last name. On the next page choose “I accept” to the Google Terms of Service.

2. BAM! You’re ready to get uploading (again, sorry for the Emeril reference).

3. You can upload directly from the website by hitting the “Upload” button or you can upload via the Picasa application, which is what is shown below. In Picasa hit the “Sign in to web albums” link in the upper left corner.

04. Once you are signed in uploading your images or folders are as easy as right clicking (either the folder or individual images) and choosing “Upload to Web Album…”

05. When you choose to upload you will be given the option to create a new album or to add to an existing album. You can also choose to resize the images from a drop down box and give a description and location of the album. You also have the ability to make the album public (anyone can view) or unlisted which allows only people you choose to view the album.

Once you’ve finished uploading your files you can view your web album at http://picasaweb.google.com/username, for instance mine is http://picasaweb.google.com/bradgroux. I encourage you to look around your Picasa Web Album where you can add image captions, input the location the picture was taken, create slideshows, order prints, share and organize. You have 1GB of storage space to share your photos, so upload at will. You can take a look at the album I uploaded here, the images were taken with my iPhone last September in Boston, MA at an Underworld show.

I’m sure you’ve all been there. You’ve gotten that new digital camera, take it out for a night on the town and get home to pull the shots off of the camera and upload them to myspace and bam… it’s like you and all of your friends have been possessed by the devil, red eyes galore. Or, you take your pictures and want to email them around to friends and family just to realize that they are huge in size and take forever to send via email. Or maybe the picture is too dark and you’d like to lighten it up a little bit? Well, Picasa is the program for you. It’s free, it is extremely easy to download and install and best of all it is very easy to use (preview full features).

First thing is first, you’ll need to head to the Picasa website and download the software by hitting the “Try Picasa Now” button. When prompted you can either choose to “Run” or “Save” the .EXE file, the file is only 5Mb in size and should only take a few seconds to download if you have a high speed connection. If you choose the save option then make sure you remember where it is saved at, and double-click on the file after it finishes downloading. After the download the install is pretty simple, hit “I Agree” to the License Agreement and then choose “Install,” it is as easy as that.

After the install you can choose to let Picasa scan your entire computer for pictures or you can direct it to a certain folder (such as your “My Pictures” in your My Documents) and only import those images. I recommend pointing to a specific directy, as the full system scan can pull in a bunch of junk images that you don’t want to or need to manage. Once you have the program installed you can import your pictures directly from your camera as needed.

Once installed open Picasa via the Start Menu or Desktop Shortcut. When you open the program you’ll notice that your images are organized via their folders in the menu on the left side of the screen. Editing your photos are as simple as clicking the folder and then the image of your choice. Take a minute and click around and browse the options for the folders as well as the options given in the menus across the top of the screen. You may notice that you can email and print directly from Picasa using the large buttons across the bottom of the screen.

When you choose a photogragh to work with you will be given a list of options along the left side of the image that allow you to tweak the picture. I’ve chosen a temporary file courtesy of Wikipedia that shows someone with extreme red eye. The options you have are to crop the image, straighten which is for images that may be at a slight angle, redeye which is self explanatory, I’m feeling lucky which is an overall auto-adjustment that sometimes works pretty well, auto contrast which only automatically adjusts the contrast of the image (brightness), an auto color option and then an added light slider. Click around and play with them all until you get a feel for them, it should be noted that Picasa automatically creates a backup of all images you edit so don’t worry about messing up!

The only option I’m going to cover is the Redeye option, as the others are pretty easy to figure out and rather self explanatory. Redeye is simple to use as well but can be tricky for some photographs and can take a few tries to get right. When you click Redeye all you need to do is click and drag a rectangle around the red eye you are trying to correct, you should make the rectangle as small as possible around the eye as sometimes it can discolor skin, especially for people blushing or with a pink hue skin tone. If you mess up, don’t worry simply hit the reset or cancel button and give it another shot. Once you’re happy with your changes hit the Apply button.

Below is a look at the finished product. The image looks a little strange since it is such an extreme shot but I asure you that the Redeye tool works extremely well. With that said I also encourage you to play around with the other options, the Auto Contrast and I’m Feeling Lucky options really can make a dull colored image come to life. Also take a look at some of the other options like creating albums, collages and a custom image screensaver… this is a very impressive application that can improve any photograph collection, especially considering it is absolutely free.

For information about resizing your photos for easier browsing and sharing check out the quick how to instructions from Google here. Don’t forget to check back tomorrow for more on Picasa and my guide to it’s integration with Google’s completely free Picasa Web photo sharing. No more emailing pictures, share them with everyone instanly!