Yesterday, I bought a small 4GB USB Flashdrive from cd-r king. My documents and music playlists could fit in it very well, but what should I do with the excess space? I found a very intuitive and productive solution: PortableApps.

First off, what is a portable app?

A portable app is basically a Windows application designed to work inside your flashdrive, iPod, or any other external drive without requiring any special hardware or software, while keeping your personalized settings as you go, and without leaving any personal traces on the PC you use it on.

There is a big list of portable apps down at PortableApps.com, with its very own PortableApps Suite as the flagship. A few famous portable apps are Mozilla Firefox Portable (browser), Thunderbird Portable (email and newsgroup), OpenOffice.org Portable (Microsoft Office replacement), and Pidgin (instant messaging).

I get the idea, but what makes portable apps different from their regular counterparts?

Portable apps run off your flashdrive without requiring installation and without leaving any trace behind. For example, when you log on to sites and save passwords on Firefox Portable, the cookies and traces are stored not on the PC where you used it, but on your flashdrive. This means that anything you do on the internet via one PC will be saved and accessible through another PC as long as your run it off your flashdrive. Moreover, portable apps are reengineered by a team of developers to work in-sync with your current activities, so that no registry keys or temporary files are made. This means that there is no way anyone can hack your sessions on the PC you used after you leave.

In my opinion, portable apps are way more convenient than laptops or notebooks if you are working on different places. No need to worry about the batteries, no need to stress your shoulders, and no need to worry about ease of use. As long as you’re not working on a train or on a bungee jump, portable apps are the way to go.

If you are worried about upgrading or keeping your internet records, then you should read the full guide. By the way, to make sure that everything’s in-sync, you should check out Toucan Portable. There’s no need to worry about security and safety too, the PortableApps Suite includes a free ClamWin A/V Portable by default.

Interface control has gone from typewriters, to card-ticking readers, then to QUERTY keyboards; then to trackballs and opticals, and now to touchscreen interfaces and dual-touch sensors.

Let’s go back to the history of our hands in the cyberworld, and rediscover the innovations that brought us to this age.

[Read more on The Critical Thinker (tm) →]

Blogertize is a newly-established blogger advertising firm, which combines the mindset of affiliate marketing, social networking, and e-commerce. The idea is simple: To make all the information available at your fingertips. Be it knowing about latest gizmos/gadgets, experiencing excursions sitting at home, updating one with the latest happenings in politics, sports & corporate world, you’re just a click away.

Instead of the usual search engine banners and links, Blogertize offers ads in forms called ‘Pixels’ — color-coded blocks where you can put your ads. In total, there four (4) types of Pixels:

• RED Pixels (100×80 px in size) worth 150 USD;
• YELLOW Pixels (100×60 px in size) worth 80 USD;
• GREEN Pixels (100×40 px in size) worth 40 USD;
• and BLUE Pixels (100×20 px in size) worth 15 USD.

Buying a Pixel is particularly easy and rewarding. Each Pixel is displayed on Blogertize’s Pixel page, under the category where your blog (or your ad) falls. For example, if you choose to buy a Pixel under the Techies’ Corner category, your ad will be visible on the Techies page together with all the other bloggers who bought Pixels there. What’s more, each Pixel that you buy can last up to three whole years! Imagine that! $15 for three years!

Plus, if your ad receives multiple clicks per day, in can go up in rank and be featured in the Top 10, where it will receive further exposure and visibility. Talk about smart advertising.

The Blogertize team is not all about money talk. They reward users who they deem worthy with additional Pixels without any further charges. That’s what exactly happened to their 1,000th blogger, Elizabeth Baarlan from Netherlands (read the article on their blog).

Blogertize’s mission is unlike any other;

Our aim is to popularize the information culture through innovative internet advertising. In this quest we engross partners who recognize the value of creating information properties for themselves as well as the community.

A popular style of internet advertising is pixel advertising which was introduced in UK but not explored at its fullest. A pixel-page is an advertising concept where advertisers buy a block of pixels in which to place their ad.

Instead of selling pixel buttons to big corporate houses, we intend to sell the space to rich content blogs & forums which have appealing articles and enlightening discussions respectively on topics ranging from sports, online gaming, current affairs, politics & health to lifestyle, travel & tourism, science, psychology, history et al.

From: About Blogertize

NGO’s and Social Work blogs would not be charged anything to advertise under the Social Responsibility section. Talk about innovation and charity, all within the mainstream of information.

Despite the fact that Blogertize’s site doesn’t look well at its current phase (with many glitches and downtime of the Forums), its team is working to deliver a better experience for its customers. A lot of bloggers have already found Blogertize an interesting prospect, with a big fraction of them already investing on the startup. It may still be on its infancy, but Blogertize already delivers the Roundhouse kick of advertising.

Useful Links:

• Blogertize on BlogCatalog Discussions
• Blogertize on Digg
• Blogertize Review on Eazy Cheezy

BUT, you don’t have to pay the site owner to remove them, all you need is a good browser and a plugin to get rid of ‘em.

The answer — Firefox and AdBlock Plus.

Ever been annoyed by all those ads and banners on the internet that often take longer to download than everything else on the page? Install Adblock Plus now and get rid of them.

Right-click on a banner and choose “Adblock” from the context menu - the banner won’t be downloaded again. Maybe even replace parts of the banner address with star symbols to block similar banners as well. Or you select a filter subscription when Adblock Plus starts up the first time, then even this simple task will usually be unnecessary: the filter subscription will block most advertisements fully automatically.

After installing AdBlock plus on your Firefox, you won’t see any ads anywhere — unless you want to override the default settings and see the ads. To do that, click on the AdBlock plus icon on the upper-righthand side of the screen, and choose “Disable on <site name>”. Refresh the page, and you’ll see the ads again.

To block a specific image from appearing on your browser, right-click on it, and choose ‘AdBlock Image’. Simple. It’s pure genius!

[AdBlock Plus at addons.mozilla.org]

And now years after the withdrawal of the N64 consoles from the market, I am here reminiscing about (and playing!) my old Nintendo 64 games. Not through the gamepad and the console iteself, but through my PC and a wonderful emulator called Project64.

In case you haven’t read about it or used it before, Project64 is an open-source Nintendo 64 emulator for Windows that delivers the very same gaming experience you have had on the N64 console. Yup, the very same. You can load up an imaged version of  an N64 game and play it as much as your heart desires. You can save games just like you did on your N64, or use Project64’s built-in save state function to save your game just as it is while you were playing it (think of Windows’s hibernate function).

Since there is more than a hundred repositories of freely downloadable N64 games out there, you will surely enjoy playing your old games without any limitations. For starters, here’s what you should do:

1. Download Project64 from here: http://www.pj64-emu.com/download;
2. Download a game file, I recommend looking for N64 games at Romulation.net;
3. Configure your input settings (for details click here);
4. Configure your video and audio settings (manuals here);
5. Make sure you have configured the items above, then load up the game file you downloaded (On Project64 main window, Press Ctrl + O);
6. Enjoy!

Right now, I’m enjoying Mario Party 1, 2, and 3; Super Mario 64, Mario Kart 64, and the timeless classic Super Smash Bros. Screenshots? You got them:

And while bits of flame are making their way through dense fire powder clouds in the air, Garena players are clicking their way to Garena’s special 2009 event. Luckily, being online on Garena at the moment the magic 2009 button appeared, I was able to click and follow the link.

Here’s where it took me:

I just got 888 EXP Points, a 2009 Background Avatar, and a 2009 New Year Giftbox! How freakin’ awesome is that?

The link? Try if it still works: http://www.garena.com/event/?e=newyear

Happy New Year everyone!

Firstly, I’d like to point out that this isn’t the standard Cutline distribution; this is the Cutline 3-Column Right [Alignment]. Aside from that, I have chopped off the upper container and removed the blog name/description, to make way for the huge banner (which rotating feature I have removed, by the way).

I have to admit, the impression and the feel of my blog is inspired from Gary James’s Strategy Online (a blog I often read and take tips from).

Anyway, I chose to use Cutline (a theme by Chris Pearson) to be the blog’s primary theme (for now) because of its ’squeaky clean’ appearance. The impression it leaves to both regular and new users is superb; impressive typography paired with colors that are easy on the eyes. Plus, it saves a lot of SEO work.

One of the main reasons why I chose Cutline is because of its overall appearance. It isn’t cluttered and messy like other themes, yet is has enough real estate to put in ads, affiliate boxes, and links. Plus, it gives the profession look of an esteemed site. Another minor reason is because of its efficiency on coding. It’s very easy to edit and resculpt, thus there’s no need to fumble through thick manuals just to add a simple patch of code.

Cutline will remain to be the blog’s theme for now (and hopefully for the rest of the coming year 2009). Let’s see how things will work out.

Lightweight, effective, free, and does not update. Wait — doesn’t update?!

Sad but true, my current installation of AVG 8.0 would not update. A component called ‘Update Manager’ has a nag, informing me of ‘Invalid Update Control CTF File’. And so, I did a little research on Google and found this:

For the past two days my AVG Anti-Virus hasn’t been downloading its definition updates.  Instead it’s been telling me that I have an “Invalid Update Control CTF File”.  I assumed this was Windows Firewall (which I have turned off) or Windows Defender (which I have throttled down), but apparently it wasn’t..

I eventually deleted all the *.CTF files in my “C:\Users\All Users\avg8\update\download” directory.  That solved the problem.  Hopefully this post will save someone else some time, let me know if it does..

strategyonline.co.za

Yippee for me, I hurriedly opened my Application Data folder on Windows XP (the counterpart for the path written on the quote above) and checked for .ctf files inside my avg8\update\download directory… and eventually found none.

Now, on the latter part of the day as I’m thumbing through research papers, I suddenly recalled having updated AVG through a .bin file on my earlier uses. With a spark of hope relighting, I went to AVG.com and looked for the latest update binaries. And found one.

Clicking on it, I faced another problem. It wouldn’t let me download! Why? I have no idea!! Download managers did not even help!

Well, okay. There’s no solution for me for this matter yet. BUT once I find one, I’ll try to summon the enthusiasm to post it here. Until then.

Here’s a cool way to celebrate the New Year’s 2009.

Coolbuster and Partners, together with KIX|TRIX and its affiliates, is celebrating the holidays with a smash — we present to you the WHAT’S IN THE BOX? contest.

1st Prize:

• One (1) Unit Brand New Nokia 6300 - from Win A Thing and Coolbuster and Partners
• A Customized Blogger Layout - from www.myweb-blog.com
• A Professional Blogger Layout - from Internet Speed Test
• 2000 Entrecard credits - from Wonderful Things in Life
• 1000 Entrecard credits - from Call Center Gal
• 1000 Entrecard credits - from A Simple Married Life
• 500 Entrecard credits - from Pinoy Copywriter
• 500 Entrecard credits - from Thoughts and Obsessions
• 500 Entrecard credits - from Coolbuster At Your Service
• $5.00 Cash - from www.carlota.angelic-pink.net
• Website Logo worth $50 - from Coolbuster Online
• 125×125 Ad Space for 3 months - in Coolbuster At Your Service
• 125×125 Ad space for 1 month - in My Life’s Adventure
• 125×125 Ad space for 12 months - in BuyPinoy
• 125×125 Ad space for 3 months - in Coolbuster Online
• 125×125 Ad space for 6 months - in Top 10 MP3
• 125×125 Ad space for 1 month - in The Fountain Of Happiness
• 125×125 Ad space for 3 months - in Internet Speed Test
• 125×125 Ad space for 1 month - in Pinoy Copywriter

• 1000 Entrecard credits - www.carlotaonline.com
• 1000 Entrecard credits - from 24×7 Online Diva
• 1000 Entrecard credits - from Pinay Freelancer
• 500 Entrecard credits - from Hit-or-Miss
• 500 Entrecard credits - from Sagada Philippines
• 300 Entrecard credits - from Coolbuster At Your Service
• $5.00 Cash - from kharlota.com
• A Professional Blogger Layout - from Internet Speed Test
• Website Logo worth $30 - from Coolbuster Online
• 125×125 Ad space for 2 months - in Coolbuster At Your Service
• 125×125 Ad space for 1 month - in The Joy Of Life Forever
• 125×125 Ad space for 8 months - in Buy Pinoy
• 125×125 Ad space for 1 month - in Thoughts and Obsessions
• 125×125 Ad space for 2 months - in Internet Speed Test
• 125×125 Ad space for 2 months - in Coolbuster Online
• 125×125 Ad space for 1 month - in Sagada Philippines

• 1000 Entrecard credits - from Moms Tips
• 1000 Entrecard credits - from The Chef’s Daughter
• 500 Entrecard credits - from Ask Ms Recipe
• 500 Entrecard credits - from Papa Ces
• A Professional Blogger Layout - from Internet Speed Test
• 200 Entrecard credits - from Coolbuster At Your Service
• Website Logo worth $20 - from Coolbuster Online
• 125×125 Ad space for 1 month - in Coolbuster At Your Service
• 125×125 Ad space for 1 month - in A Message From My Heart
• 125×125 Ad space for 6 months - in Buy Pinoy
• 125×125 Ad space for 1 month - in Coolbuster Online
• 125×125 Ad space for 1 month - in Internet Speed Test
• 125×125 Ad space for 1 month - in Love Is A Perfect Gift
• 125×125 Ad space for 1 month - in Papa Ces

1. Write / blog about this contest stating all prizes and sponsors.
2. Include in your post(s) your guess (one guess per post) on what is inside the box, additional 5 entries if you get it right. (LOL! This is fun!)
3. Include the contest logo in your article / post.
4. Put our banner in your sidebar.
5. Subscribe to our feed via email.
6. Leave a comment along with the link of your post(s).

Additional Information:

• All sponsors can join this contest.
• Additional prizes will be posted. The author will be sending fliers with Sanyo Philippines and a major Mall chain for sponsorship (how about that!).
• The prizes are subject to change (for the better) without prior notice.
• We will accept prize sponsorships from advertisers, website owners and bloggers until April 30, 2009.

Hurry! Coolbuster’s WHAT’S IN THE BOX? contest is only from January 1, 2009 to May 28, 2009. For more information, please visit [http://coolbusteratyourservice.blogspot.com/2008/12/coolbusters-whats-in-box-contest.html]

The bad news — I got hold of a copy of a horribly pathetic game that I can’t even begin to loath more. NBA 08.

That’s right: NBA 08. You may be thinking of that wonderful game that features famous ballers as its cover boys and awesome Season and Dynasty mode plays, well, I did too. That’s NBA Live 08.

After loading it up on my PSP, I noticed that its splash screen is different from the usual splash screen on NBA Live games, but thinking that it may be another port of the game, I still urged to play a normal quickie. I was horribly dismayed to find that it’s an entirely different game. The gameplay sucks, the movement feels lousy, and the graphics: horribly clipped at all views.

I was so disappointed that I didn’t even hesitate to throw the game away permanently. Shredded and thrown away. Well, technically.

And now, I’m planning to go back to the store later. This time, my hopes are high.

By the way, be sure to read GameSpot’s official review on NBA 08.

NBA 08 is horrible. It’s not a thing worth wasting time for. Get NBA Live 08 instead.