Driven to Distraction: Internet On Your Dashboard

To the dismay of safety advocates worried about driver distraction, car makers are finding a new place for your PC, the front seat.

Intel and Google are turning their attention from the desktop to the dashboard, to bring irresistible apps via 10-inch screens above the gearshift.

Showing high-definition videos, 3-D maps and Web pages, the first wave of these “infotainment systems,” will hit the market this year. They can still pull up content as varied as restaurant reviews and the covers of music albums with the tap of a finger

However, they prevent drivers from watching video and using some other functions while the car is moving.

Safety advocates say the companies behind these technologies are tone-deaf to mounting research showing the risks of distracted driving. Harvard estimates that motorists talking on cellphones caused 2,600 fatal accidents and 570,000 accidents involving injuries a year.

One system on the way this fall from Audi lets drivers pull up information as they drive. Heading to Madison Square Garden for a basketball game? Pop down the touch pad, finger-scribble the word “Knicks” and get a Wikipedia entry on the arena, photos and reviews of nearby restaurants, and animations of the ways to get there.

Also in the works, technology like voice commands and screens that can simultaneously show a map to the driver and a movie to a front-seat passenger. Ford’s new MyFord system lets the driver adjust temperature settings or call a friend while the car is in motion, while its built-in Web browser works only when the car is parked.

New high-end multimedia systems are due out this year that use full-fledged PC chips from Intel and Nvidia. Such chips once consumed too much electricity to be used in cars.

A complex new dashboard console from Ford, which it plans to unveil Thursday, brings the car firmly into the land of electronic gadgets. The 4.2-inch color screen to the left of the speedometer displays information about the car, like the fuel level, while a companion screen on the right shows things like the name of a cellphone caller or the title of the digital song file being played. An eight-inch touch screen tops the central console, displaying things like control panels and, when the car is not moving, Web pages.

The system has Wi-Fi capability, two U.S.B. ports and a place to plug in a keyboard — in short, many of the features of a standard PC.

Companies that make chips for PCs and that want to see their processors slotted into the 70 million cars sold worldwide each year.

The muscle of the computer industry adds powerful new backing to efforts by carmakers to introduce new technologies as a source of profit. Once they promoted advanced stereos, but now navigation and integrated phone systems are the hot items.

Virginia Tech Transportation Institute says motorists face a much greater crash risk when looking at a screen, even if it is just a simple GPS map, and, that the overall danger for drivers will rise as screens deliver additional streams of data.

The longer a motorist looks away from the road, “the risk of crash or near crash goes up exponentially — not a linear increase, but exponentially,” V.T.T.I. says. “So when you start introducing things like e-mail, Internet access, restaurant options or anything like that, the risk goes up.”

Source: New York Times

We've Had Enough of the Cold Snap

So has Calvin, please click on comics at left to enlarge...

As Goes January, So Goes the Year in Stocks?

January is bellwether time for the stock market. A strong start for stocks often bodes well for the months that follow.

Historically, the first few trading days of January have been among the strongest for stock performance, because this is when individuals and pension plans add big chunks of new money to retirement accounts. Whether people follow their normal pattern and pump money into stocks in January can be a sign of the market's prospects for the coming weeks, and even for the entire year.

If stocks rise in January, they often finish the year strongly. If stocks are weak during this normally propitious time, stocks tend to do poorly.

January was weak in both 2008 and 2009. In 2008, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell another 30% in the following 11 months, marking one of the worst stock-market years on record. In 2009, the January decline was followed by an 18% plunge to a 12-year low in March. Only after that pain did stocks roar back.

This time, stocks already have gotten off to a disappointing start.

In normal years, investors try to front-run the expected January rise, and they bid stocks higher in late December. Since 1900, the Dow has risen a median 1% in the last five trading days of December, according to Ned Davis Research, more than four times the median rise for five-day periods in general. In the five final trading days of this December, however, the Dow actually fell 0.37%.

Now, investors are worrying about whether the December weakness will carry through into January. If so, it could augur poorly for 2010, or at least for the first months.

"Strong years for equities normally show investment-buying early, with great upside momentum in January; most bad years start with down Januarys," notes Phil Roth, chief technical market analyst at New York brokerage house Miller Tabak + Co., in a report on January's importance.

What analysts would like to see now is a strong January rally on heavy volume, suggesting investors are pouring new money into U.S. stocks. During much of the Dow's big post-March rally, trading volume has been below-average, suggesting that many investors remain skeptical of U.S. stocks. If volume remains low in January, it would be a further indication of investor doubt.

"I don't think we are going to see the best of Januarys, but perhaps better than we have seen" in recent years, says Bruce McCain, who helps oversee $22 billion as chief investment strategist at Cleveland's Key Private Bank. Ordinary investors remain nervous about stock prospects and may not buy as much as in a normal January, he says.

Data support the idea that this period is a bellwether. Since 1900, the Dow's median rise for the first five trading days of January is 0.63%, almost triple the median increase for ordinary five-day periods, according to Ned Davis Research.

The data also suggest that performance for the full month of January can be linked to what follows.

In years when the Dow has risen in the first month of the year, the median rise for the rest of the year is 10.4%. In years when the Dow has fallen, the median rise for the next 11 months is just 0.28%.

Because of the inflows of new cash, January has seen stock advances 62% of the time since 1900, well above the average of 57% for all months.

In fact, November, December and January typically are the market's strongest three-month stretch, as investors position themselves for the new year. Early December often is soft, possibly because tax-conscious investors are selling losing stocks to generate tax losses that they can balance against taxable gains in other stocks. If things are on a normal footing, that weakness should be over by late December, and stocks should be rising ahead of a strong January.

Analysts still have plenty of doubts about how much more U.S. stocks will benefit.

Investor optimism seems to be rising now, so there could be strong flows of new money into financial markets in January, says Edgar Peters, an investment strategist who helps oversee $15 billion at First Quadrant in Pasadena, Calif.

"The question is where new investment money will go this time," Mr. Peters says. In the post-February rally, investors tended to put new money into bonds and into emerging markets, such as India and China, rather than into U.S. stocks.

Starting in March, investors have removed a net $22.65 billion from U.S.-stock mutual funds, while adding a net $34.27 billion to foreign-stock funds and $315.54 billion to bond funds.

"It is more likely that we will see further flows into emerging markets, since those are the best-performing right now," Mr. Peters says.

Some market analysts worry that stocks could perform moderately well in January, but that problems could show up later in the year, as central banks try to mop up some of the hundreds of billions of dollars they pumped into the financial system.

"The tailwinds that have been in place are likely to continue into the first half of 2010," says Jeffrey Kleintop, chief market strategist at brokerage house LPL Financial in Boston. "Those tailwinds fade as the Federal Reserve discontinues its programs, including programs to buy mortgage-backed bonds. And it isn't just the Fed: It could be the first time in history that almost every central bank in the world is constraining monetary policy."

Mr. McCain of Key Private Bank is warning clients to beware of market trouble later in the year.

What is more, corporate-profit expectations will be rising as the year progresses, and it could become harder for companies to keep meeting those expectations, says Russ Koesterich, head of investment strategy at Barclays Global Investors in San Francisco.

He also worries that government borrowing to cover mounting deficits eventually could push up interest rates, hurting both bonds and stocks.

from Wall Street Journal

More Brokers Flee Big Firms, Taking Investors With Them

Independent financial advisers are gaining ground from Wall Street brokers in the competition to manage more than $5 trillion in Americans' savings.

The ranks of brokers at major Wall Street firms have been shrinking, along with those firms' share of the retail-investing market. At the same time, independent advisers are growing in number and market share.

The financial turmoil of the past 18 months is fueling the shift. Shaken by the collapse of some Wall Street firms and the tarnished reputations of others, more big-firm brokers are breaking away to manage money on their own, taking clients with them.

Brett Sharkey, Eric Thurber and Fred Molfino, who oversaw $740 million in business at Morgan Stanley Smith Barney, left in August to set up Three Bridge Wealth Advisors in Menlo Park, Calif. Many clients followed. Eric Thurber and two associates, who oversaw $740 million at Morgan Stanley Smith Barney, set up their own business in August. Many clients followed them. After the collapse of Lehman Brothers in the fall of 2008, Mr. Thurber says, "we realized that we could be at risk" even at a major firm.

Boston research firm Cerulli Associates last year projected that brokers leaving major firms would take $188 billion in client accounts with them in 2009, the first year Cerulli has tried to measure that movement of money. Cerulli expects the trend to continue this year.

Other data suggest that big firms saw money flow out in 2008, too. Financial statements from the biggest brokerage firms, including UBS AG and Bank of America Corp.'s Merrill Lynch Wealth Management, show a collective net outflow in 2008 of about $20 billion in client money, counting both money removed by departing brokers and money withdrawn by clients whose brokers didn't leave. Those figures reflect client actions, not market gains and losses.

The big firms say they are poised to rebound and that they wanted to push out many of the departing brokers because they weren't bringing in as much profit as others. "The majority of departures have been people with below-average revenue production," says a spokeswoman for Morgan Stanley Smith Barney.

Major Wall Street firms still handled 48% of the money from individual investors under management at the end of 2008, while independent advisers handled 19%, according to Cerulli. But Cerulli forecasts that by 2012, the big-firm share will be down to 41%, while the independent advisers' share will be more than 23%. The balance of the money is managed by smaller brokerage firms, insurance companies and banks.

The number of brokers serving individual clients at major firms fell 14% to less than 55,000 in the three years ending in December 2008, while the number of independent financial advisers rose 29% to 33,000, Cerulli Associates says.

Mr. Thurber, the Morgan Stanley Smith Barney broker who jumped ship, says he hadn't considered a change until Lehman collapsed and he saw friends at that firm suffer. His employer then was Smith Barney, which hadn't yet merged with Morgan Stanley and was part of Citigroup Inc., whose stock was plunging. He and his two colleagues, whose brokerage-firm salaries were well into the six figures, manage money for entrepreneurs and venture capitalists in Silicon Valley.

They secretly planned their move for nine months before they left. Mr. Thurber recalls a tense debate in the dining room of one of his partners about whether they could afford to abandon their salaries and bonuses.

"It certainly gave each of us pause about whether it made sense for us to walk away," he says. Initially, the cost of starting and running a business would reduce their incomes, he says. In the longer run, he says, "we did the analysis that, counting equity in our new firm, if we did all the hard work, it would be worth it."

At their new firm, Three Bridge Wealth Advisors in Menlo Park, Calif., they are free of certain constraints, Mr. Thurber says. At big brokerage firms, brokers can sell only financial products approved by their firms. Independent advisers face no such restrictions.

A Morgan Stanley spokeswoman says that turnover among brokers overseeing larger amounts of money "is at historic lows."

Not all brokers leaving major firms are going it alone. Independent firms say they're seeing an uptick in interest from big-firm brokers.

"We are receiving unsolicited resumes from senior people" at major brokerage firms, says Steven Giacona, founder of wealth-advisory firm Round Table Services in Westfield, N.J., which oversees about $700 million. "I have been talking to people who never imagined they would be talking about these things. But these events have put them and their clients in a situation where they feel they need to make a change." So far, he says, he has hired one big-firm broker.

Brokerage firms are fueling the movement by pushing out lower-volume brokers. A typical strategy is to cut compensation, a process known as putting brokers "in the penalty box." Lower producers who had been taking home 40% of their fees and commissions might be told they now will keep only 20%. Their realistic choices: boost revenues, move to a smaller firm or go independent.

Tim Noonan, who faced a compensation cut as a broker in Merrill's Atlanta office, left in February 2009 with most of his clients. He formed Noonan Capital Management with about $40 million in client money, he says.

Mr. Noonan says he didn't like being pressed to boost revenues. He also didn't like working in a system where he was paid more to put his clients into stocks than into certificates of deposit. At his own firm, he charges clients a flat percentage of money under management, no matter how it's invested.

"I wanted to own my own business, create my own value," he says. "I can will it to my children. I can sell it."

Independent advisers have a powerful ally in the competition with big firms: discount brokerage firms.

Independent advisers need someone to conduct trades, store securities, keep track of client accounts and perform other back-office jobs. The discount-brokerage operations of Charles Schwab Corp., Fidelity Investments and TD Ameritrade Holding Corp., among others, have built big businesses doing those things for independent advisers. As the trend toward independence grows, the discounters are redoubling efforts to persuade brokers to go independent.

Tom Cantillon leads a group in Schwab's New York office that urges brokers to go independent and bring their business to Schwab. He and his people phone brokers at their offices, sometimes early in the morning or at night in hopes the brokers will pick up directly. Mr. Cantillon says he asks: "Have you ever considered a different model for your business?"

Discount firms are using emails, seminars and junk mail to lure brokers into independence. They offer free help with paperwork, free software, and reduced-cost or free trades during the transition period. If breakaway brokers aren't comfortable creating their own businesses, the discount firms will help them, for no charge, find existing independent financial firms that want new associates.

Schwab held workshops around the country last year to show brokers how to go independent. Fidelity hired a senior executive from Morgan Stanley to handle its business with independent advisers, including attracting them from brokerage firms. In the first three quarters of 2009, Fidelity says, breakaway brokers brought it more than $6 billion in new money to be managed, equaling the amount it received in all of 2008.

Brian Doe left Merrill in 2009, urged on by Schwab recruiters. Before the financial crisis hit, he and his clients liked being at a big, established firm, Mr. Doe says. After Merrill teetered and was sold to Bank of America, Mr. Doe, a nine-year Merrill veteran who managed more than $50 million for 90 clients, rethought his position.

"The day that a company of that tenure and stature can get sold off to a bank over a weekend is a little disconcerting to someone at my career level," says Mr. Doe, who is 42 years old. "I was spending a lot of time explaining what the firm was doing, at a time when the market was down and people's portfolio values were careening."

Unhappy to see Merrill cutting support staff, he began speaking with others in the business and discovered that the man who had helped him start at Merrill had founded his own firm, Atlanta's Gratus Capital Management. Mr. Doe joined Gratus in February 2009.

Steven Schwalb, a client, says he was happy with Mr. Doe but wary of the hassle of moving his money from Merrill. His mortgage-banking business was chaotic and he was helping care for newborn twins, so he didn't follow Mr. Doe to Gratus.

"We had a lot going on in our lives, so the last thing we wanted to do was upset anything else," he says. "We weren't really sure it was the right move for us to go to a smaller company."

But he says he didn't develop as good a relationship with his new Merrill broker, so he got back in touch with Mr. Doe and moved his money to Gratus. At Gratus, Mr. Schwalb says, he has access to a wide range of mutual funds and other investments, with lower commission costs than at big brokerage firms. The Schwalbs pay Mr. Doe an annual fee to monitor their finances, including advising them on all investment and financial-planning decisions.

A Bank of America spokeswoman says clients are benefiting from the Merrill acquisition, internal surveys indicate that they are satisfied, and "we continue to attract and retain highly successful advisers."

Some banks are trying to take advantage of the changes. The brokerage arm of Wells Fargo & Co., which acquired Wachovia Securities in late 2008, is offering brokers who want to go independent the chance to work with it on a contract basis, even if they are former Wells Fargo brokers. They sell financial products through Wells Fargo's trading desk but operate as independent businesses. Wells Fargo now works with about 1,000 independent advisers.

Officials at other brokerage firms say the shift toward independent advisers is something they can reverse. Many brokers are more comfortable staying at big firms, which take care of product support and back-office issues. Big firms say they are retaining brokers they want to keep, notably those who handle wealthier investors.

"I think that we have capabilities in this business to be able to do things for clients that the boutiques will just not be able to do," Robert McCann, chief executive of UBS's U.S. brokerage arm, said at a recent conference.

Some in the brokerage business argue that the Madoff Ponzi-scheme scandal will frighten clients of smaller firms, pushing them toward brand-name brokerages. They also say that if money managers face new regulation, as has been discussed, smaller firms might be less well-equipped to deal with the burden.

That doesn't appear to be diminishing interest among brokers contemplating change.

Ralph Courage, a broker in Norfolk, Va., left UBS to set up an independent firm in 2008. "I have received many calls from top investment folks at brokerage firms around the country," he says, "who have heard that we have made this move, saying, 'We would really like to do this and tell me all about it."

from Wall Street Journal

Dubai Skyscraper

The world's tallest building is 828 metres and has been named Burj Khalifa in Dubai.

http://skyscraperpage.com/cities/?buildingID=7787

http://gulfnews.com/business/property/burj-dubai-renamed-as-burj-khalifa-1.562401

Pez Inventor Dies

Curtis Allina, a candy company executive who helped bring the world the modern Pez dispenser has died at 87.

He presided over a powerful innovation in marketing that was less about the candy itself than it was about the container it came in — and created a universe of fanatically obsessed collectors.

For nearly three decades after World War II, Mr. Allina was the vice president in charge of United States operations at what is now Pez Candy. In 1955, at his urging, what had been an austerely packaged Austrian confection for adults took on vibrant new life as a children’s product.

That year, the first character dispensers, as they are known in the parlance of Peziana, were issued, giving birth to what is today a highly collectible pop-cultural artifact. Instantly recognizable, the dispensers are slim plastic containers, usually anthropomorphic in design, whose heads — modeled after those of TV characters, cartoon figures or historical personages — flip back to disgorge brick-shaped pieces of candy.

Driven in large part by baby-boomer nostalgia, Pez dispensers are now a staple of eBay and the ubiquitous subject of conventions, Web sites, newsletters, books and even a museum, the Burlingame Museum of Pez Memorabilia in Burlingame, Calif. They have been featured in movies; a memorable “Seinfeld” episode (in which Elaine ruins a piano recital by laughing uncontrollably at the sight of a Pez dispenser); and a 2006 documentary, “PEZheads: The Movie,” which explores the Pez-collecting phenomenon.

Today, Pez Candy, based in Orange, Conn., sells tens of thousands of dispensers each year in 80 countries.

A Pez dispenser is a simple little machine: back snaps the head, out pops the candy, and the head flicks shut again with a satisfying click. But oh, the variations, from a spate of licensed characters to those designed by Pez. For serious collectors, the most highly prized dispensers, long discontinued, are elusive objects of desire that can run to thousands of dollars apiece.

Hundreds of different dispensers are extant. (“Hundreds” is a conservative estimate, for collectors count minute alterations in a dispenser’s shape or color as meaningful in ways civilians do not.) They include Popeye Pez, Pokémon Pez and Paul Revere Pez; SpongeBob Pez and Elvis Pez (in several historical variants, from ’50s boyish through ’70s dissipated); Mozart Pez, Hello Kitty Pez and Mickey Mouse Pez.

Precisely whose idea it was to put heads on Pez dispensers — previously headless, unadorned and tastefully Viennese — is the subject of continuing debate among Pez historians. In a telephone interview, David Welch, the author of “Collecting PEZ” (Bubba Scrubba Publications, 1994), said that in researching his book he encountered half a dozen possible candidates, Mr. Allina among them. This much, Mr. Welch said, is certain:

“The idea came from the United States. And for the idea to have come out of the United States and made it to Austria where it could be approved, Allina was the only guy who could have made that happen.”

Curtis Allina was born Aug. 15, 1922, in Prague, and raised in Vienna. Between 1941 and 1945, he and his family, Sephardic Jews, were forced into a series of concentration camps. Mr. Allina emerged at war’s end as his family’s sole survivor in Europe. Making his way to New York, he worked for a commercial meatpacker before joining Pez-Haas, as the company’s United States arm was then known, in 1953.

Pez was invented in 1927 by Eduard Haas III, a Viennese food-products mogul. Small, rectangular and mint-flavored (the name is a contraction of pfefferminz, the German word for peppermint), the candy was marketed to adults as an alternative to smoking. Originally sold in tins, Pez was repackaged in the late 1940s in plain, long-stemmed dispensers meant to suggest cigarette lighters.

Introduced into the United States in the early 1950s, Pez sold fitfully. Then someone thought of remarketing it as a children’s candy, in fruit flavors, packed in whimsical dispensers. It fell to Mr. Allina to persuade the home office in Vienna, by all accounts a conservative outfit that took sober pride in its grown-up mint.

Mr. Allina prevailed, and the first two character dispensers, Santa Claus and a robot known as the Space Trooper, were introduced in 1955. Unlike today’s plain-stemmed, headed-and-footed dispensers, both were full-body figures, completely sculptured from top to toe.

Mr. Allina, who left Pez in 1979, was later an executive of Au’Some Candies.

Mr. Allina’s first marriage, to Hanna Hofmann, ended in divorce. He is survived by his second wife, Hannelore; two children from his first marriage, Babette Allina and Johnny Allina; two children from his second marriage, Tanya Carlson and Alexia Allina; and three grandchildren.

His legacy also includes hundreds of Pez-related Web sites, dozens of conferences with names like the Swedish Pez Gathering and the Slovenian Pez Convention, and scores of organizations, from Lone Star Pez (in North Texas) to the Association Française des Collectionneurs de Pez. There is a collector in Oklahoma who owns a Pez-dispenser-encrusted automobile, and thousands of others around the world, it is entirely safe to assume, who dream Pez-infused dreams at night.

Perhaps all this renders moot the question of who came up with the now-familiar dispenser in the first place.

“Whose idea was it? Who the hell knows,” Mr. Welch, the Pez historian, said. “Who was more important in getting it done? Allina.”

More iSlate Rumors

Apple has rented a stage at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco and is expected to make a major product announcement on Tuesday, Jan. 26, where many have speculated that some version of the Apple tablet will be unveiled. The Web site Gizmodo guessed that the device was likely to be called the iSlate, will cost around $800, and won’t hit store shelves until March or possibly April.

http://gizmodo.com/5434397/the-apple-tablets-name-islate-at-least-it-sure-looks-that-way

http://brainstormtech.blogs.fortune.cnn.com/2010/01/04/the-ny-times-hearts-apples-islate/

Hello... You're Drunk

Here's a nifty product that fills a social need: it's a FREE app that calculates when or if you should drive.

While you may think the idea is hokey (or a big "no duh"), it's biggest draw is that it's fun to use, even in a crowd at a bar. What could be better than that?

For one "tester", the app proclaimed, "don't even think about it." While she was surprised at the time (read: the normal impaired-judgment effect of alcohol), her hangover the next day confirmed the app's assessment.

But the best part of all?

"When she pulled out the iPhone app at a bar the other night, her friends all clamored to take a turn - and the subject was suddenly very much on the table.

Another advantage: people may be more apt to listen to her phonethan to a friend who tries to take away her keys.

For some, the app 'feels very solid and mathematical and trustworthy, and nonjudgmental.'"

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/gurley/detail?entry_id=54425#ixzz0bZxd0iM0

In Miami, Chefs Are the New Stars

OCEAN swims, Ocean Drive, Art Deco, Art Basel, palms and pulchritude: these are what draw the crowds to Miami. But not me — at least not anymore. When I go back, it will be for the “Pop-Tarts.”

They’re a new addition to the menu at Michael’s Genuine Food & Drink, which started serving brunch — and thus the Pop-Tarts — in late October. And they’re not, of course, the supermarket variety. They’re a proper pastry chef’s riff on those childhood favorites, miniaturized and so adorably dimpled on the edges that I wasn’t sure whether to eat or cuddle with them. I opted for eating, trying both the gooey blackberry and the sunny yuzu. Sometimes, but not that day, Michael’s serves Nutella-flavored ones, too. I’m checking airfares as I type.

During most of my past trips to this sun-kissed American playground, I’d been disappointed by its restaurant scene, crammed as it was with too many steakhouses and too much vacuous glitz.

If I looked for low-cost Latin fare, especially Cuban cooking, I had luck. But it was harder to find impressive meals by principled chefs whose work spanned diverse ethnic traditions and participated fully in the culinary conversation of the moment.

Thanks in part to the momentum created by the 2007 opening of Michael’s in the Miami Design District, that’s changed, and the city’s restaurant scene has experienced a remarkable growth spurt: the sexy new tapas restaurant Sra. Martinez, also in the Design District; the first American outpost of Hakkasan, London’s fabled Chinese restaurant, in Miami Beach’s lavishly renovated Fontainebleau hotel; Red Light, a sort of upscale diner where the Caribbean and the American South meet.

When thousands of food lovers descend on this city next month for the South Beach Wine & Food Festival, they’ll be able to range across an impressive restaurant landscape. And when other travelers flock here through the winter for a balmy break, they’ll discover that they don’t have to trade great meals for good weather.

Sra. Martinez

If they’re smart they’ll hit Sra. Martinez, which nabbed nationwide attention pretty much the minute it opened in December 2008.

The chef Michelle Bernstein’s work at the restaurant Michy’s in Miami had established her as one of Miami’s culinary stars (well enough known to merit an appearance as a guest judge on “Top Chef”); at Sra. Martinez she has turned in a glossier and more ethnically specific direction, joining a sort of gastronomic revolution in the Design District.

Like Michael’s and other restaurants in the district, Sra. Martinez meets the street with a spacious outdoor patio and a canopy of palms: Miami restaurateurs tend not to let the local weather or flora go to waste. (As for its name, Sra. means señora, and Ms. Bernstein owns the restaurant with her husband, David Martinez.)

The interior of Sra. Martinez is even more attractive, with its two-story-high ceiling, its enormous windows and, in the back, up a staircase, a second-story dining alcove that overlooks the main first-story room.

The menu presents a carefully considered mix of relatively traditional tapas (ham croquetas, patatas bravas) and innovative ones that reflect the cooking not just of Spain but also of its former colonies: grilled prawns, for instance, are sprinkled with popcorn and corn nuts, both of which Ms. Bernstein said are used in Peru as an accouterment for ceviche.

Other creations spring from Ms. Bernstein’s fertile imagination. One such dish is the “egg yolk carpaccio,” a pool of whipped egg yolks, olive oil and coarse salt that’s baked until it takes on a carpaccio-esque texture, then studded with tiny shrimp and topped with shoestring potatoes.

Servers provide bread for scooping up the yolk mixture, and the overall experience was one of a deliciously unceremonious breakfast nudging up against a more refined dinner. It was a heady confluence, made headier still by the restaurant’s bounty of Spanish wines, scores of them, seizing the foreground from France and Italy, which too often dominate it.

Pacific Time

Elsewhere in the Design District, a few fashionable, landlocked blocks of galleries and showrooms, Fratelli Lyon offers Italian food in contemporary trappings, and the chef Jonathan Eismann has established a modern pizzeria, Pizza Volante. It’s just one prong of his huge investment in the neighborhood, where he will soon open Fin, serving local seafood, and Q American Barbeque.

But Mr. Eismann’s real showpiece in the Design District is Pacific Time, which serves pan-Asian food. After more than a decade in South Beach, this Miami favorite moved to a handsome yet utterly relaxed new setting away from the surf.

A front patio leads to a dining room that’s visually dominated by a long bar, where bottles sit in precise positions on backlighted shelves, and by a partially open kitchen. There’s a sense of controlled bustle, and there’s dark wood and a warm, honeyed glow throughout.

Reading Pacific Time’s menu — or, for that matter, merely focusing on its name — provokes some cognitive dissonance, in that the restaurant looks to countries on the big ocean that Miami is nowhere near.

It takes in Thailand, Japan, China and India, and thus assembles a larder including house-made hoisin sauce (for duck confit), tamarind (for the salmon yaki), red curry and coconut water (for the local black grouper cheeks) and sake and edamame (for the black cod).

To further the confusion, Pacific Time throws in some dishes — sheep’s milk ricotta gnudi, for example — with Mediterranean bearings.

But who needs ethnic logic and clarity when there are outsize delights like Pacific Time’s soft-shell crab, dressed in a fermented black bean vinaigrette? It was exceptional, and yet paled beside the restaurant’s signature hot-and-sour popcorn shrimp, with their gossamer casings around a succulent core.

Michael’s Genuine Food & Drink

The shining star of the district and, arguably, the entire city is Michael’s, a New American bistro with an emphasis on the fruits of Florida’s soil and seas and an insistence on making just about everything — the pastrami, the pickles, the jams, the sodas — in house.

Named for its chef-owner, Michael Schwartz, the restaurant simply radiates joy, in its sum and in its parts: the red and purple color scheme inside; the glass walls between interior and exterior dining areas; the jazz soundtrack; the loquacious servers; the open kitchen, with its prominently displayed wood-burning stove.

I first ate here in early 2008, when I came for dinner. Michael’s served lunch then, too, but the restaurant’s outstanding brunch didn’t come along until the fall of 2009.

All three menus — dinner, lunch and brunch — have clearly been written with one question in mind: will customers yearn to eat everything on them?

They will, and the sillier something on the menu sounds, the better it tends to be. The restaurant’s masterpiece, in fact, isn’t any of the fine Florida seafood that’s roasted in that wood-burning oven, or even the gorgeous, bountiful salads, bejeweled with macadamia nuts, pickled pearl onions and papaya. It’s the house-made, thick-cut potato chips with pan-fried onion dip.

They get stiff competition, though, from anything and everything the pastry chef, Hedy Goldsmith, whips up. She’s all slyness and nostalgia, with her “Mounds bar” tart and her red velvet cupcakes and those Pop-Tarts, oh those warm, crisp, tender Pop-Tarts.

And she answers each of the savory hits on Mr. Schwartz’s side of the brunch menu — like an omelet that pays homage to a Reuben sandwich and a chicken-salad sandwich better than any I’d ever had — with a home run of her own. Get the fudgy peanut butter brownie with malted chocolate sauce. Just don’t plan to eat again for five years.

Red Light

The spirit of playfulness that defines Michael’s is also present at Red Light, a modest restaurant of immodest pleasures.

Located in another overlooked Miami neighborhood that’s being spruced up, the MiMo district, Red Light is situated alongside a canal in which manatees — and the occasional alligator — swim. It sprawls up and down stairs and in and out of doors in a deliberately ramshackle fashion, and it’s decorated with strings of little lights.

The menu that has been put together by Kris Wessel, the chef and owner, nods to the Caribbean, Mexico, the American South and even New Orleans. In the unpretentious manner of the moment, it traffics heavily in fatty and starchy fare — with the bacon abundant, the ribs present and accounted for, the sides making room for both macaroni and cheese and Gorgonzola grits.

There are three kinds of grilled cheese sandwiches, and that struck me as possible overkill until I tried the one with Fontina and (of course) bacon and instantly regretted not getting the other two as well. Scandalously thick and rich, it was more sandwich than anyone can reasonably handle, and I bet no one leaves so much as a crumb or rivulet.

Red Light also serves fish whose freshness is beyond dispute. We had a plump, perfectly cooked fillet of sautéed lane snapper, glistening with butter on a king-size bed of rice. If you’re looking for spa cuisine, don’t look to Red Light.

Area 31

I found seafood done with a lighter touch (for the most part) at Area 31, a sleek, almost minimalist restaurant perched on the 16th floor of the Epic Hotel downtown, with stunning views of the glittering skyscrapers around it.

After I ate there in early December, Area 31 was closed, along with the rest of the Epic hotel, for two weeks because Legionnaires’ disease was diagnosed in three people who had visited the hotel. One died; the others recovered.

After many tests and adjustments to the hotel’s water system, public health officials cleared the restaurant to reopen last weekend.

I hope Area 31 doesn’t suffer for that long, pregnant pause, because I admire its emphasis on sustainable seafood from the Atlantic fishing zone comprising Florida, Central America and northern South America. (The restaurant takes its name from that zone.)

About half of the appetizers are crudo compositions, and the “ocean to table” category of entrees presents a changing roster of half a dozen kinds of fresh fish.

We ordered a five-course tasting menu, very reasonably priced at $50 a person, and though it was uneven, the fried clams were outstanding.

Hakkasan

Downtown Miami and Miami Beach have both grown considerably flashier in recent years, on account of the pre-recession real-estate boom. The newly renovated Fontainebleau hotel, now awash in colored lights and gleaming with new marble, provides the perfect example. It’s home to several particularly prominent new restaurants, including Gotham Steak from Alfred Portale, and a second Scarpetta from the chef Scott Conant, whose first one is in Manhattan’s meatpacking district. But the biggest news at the Fontainebleau is Hakkasan, an exotic labyrinth of carved teak walls and turquoise upholstery. (The original Hakkasan, in London, is precisely the sort of haute Chinese exemplar that New York craves but lacks.)

Almost all of the dozen or so dishes I sampled at the Miami branch were superbly cooked. The meat on the tea-smoked ribs didn’t so much fall as ooze off the bone. The dumplings in a seafood dim sum platter were textbook — bouncy on the outside, juicy within.

None of this came cheap. Just three courses can easily cost $60, and in that context the occurrence of a soup as wan as the red snapper with watercress proved frustrating.

But the service was impeccable, and Chinese cuisine of this ambition, with an ambience this opulent, is rare. It doesn’t exist in bigger cities better known for their restaurant scenes. That Miami has it is a revelation — and a reason to go.

THE BOTTOM LINE

Area 31, Epic Hotel, 270 Biscayne Boulevard Way, Miami; (305) 424-5234; area31restaurant.com. Dinner appetizers, $8 to $14; entrees, $16 to $38.

Hakkasan, Fontainebleau Miami Beach, 4441 Collins Avenue, Miami Beach; (877) 326-7412; www.fontainebleau.com. Dinner appetizers, $8 to $24; entrees, $18 to $48.

Michael’s Genuine Food & Drink, 130 N.E. 40th Street; (305) 573-5550; michaelsgenuine.com. Dinner, small plates, $8 to $16; medium plates, $11 to $21; large, $19 to $36. Brunch dishes, $4 to $21.

Pacific Time, 35 N.E. 40th Street, Miami; (305) 722-7369; www.pacifictimerestaurant.com. Dinner, small plates and salads, $6 to $15; entrees $18 to $26.

Red Light, 7700 Biscayne Boulevard, Miami; (305) 757-7773; www.redlightmiami.com. Dinner appetizers are $6 to $14, and entrees, $9 to $30.

Sra. Martinez, 4000 N.E. 2nd Avenue, Miami; (305) 573-5474; www.sramartinez.com. Tapas, $7 to $18; large plates, $24 to $38.

source: New York Times Magazine

The Year’s Best Tech Ideas

Here's a round-up of 2009's best technology and geeky ideas and gadgets !

DROID DOCKS

The Motorola Droid, of course, is an app phone (that is, an iPhone wannabe with a black rectangular touch screen, etc.). It’s generally a very good one, with slide-out keyboard, excellent speed and the Verizon network.

The winner here isn’t the phone, though — it’s the docks. One $30 plastic dock suctions to your windshield. When you slip the phone into it, hidden magnetic sensors automatically fill the Droid’s screen with Google’s new GPS navigation software, complete with turn-by-turn driving directions, spoken street names, color coding to indicate traffic, map icons (for parking and so on), satellite view and more.

Or buy the $30 home dock. When you insert the Droid, the screen becomes a handsome, horizontal-layout alarm-clock/weather display, complete with buttons that let you access your music or even dim the screen for sleepy time. You have to charge your phone overnight anyway, so why shouldn’t it be doing something useful in the meantime?

ITYPE2GO

In 2009, the risks of text messaging went mainstream. Statistics made it clear that texting while driving was shockingly common — and incredibly dangerous.

But what about texting while walking? You’re looking down as you flail away on your keyboard; next thing you know, you’ve crashed right into a person, a tree or a fence. Trust me: It’s hard to look cool when you’ve just face-planted on a No Parking sign.

Fortunately, iType2Go (a $1 iPhone app) is a funny idea that really works. It superimposes what you’re typing over a live camera view, so you can see where you’re going even while you’re focused on the screen.

With the touch of a button, you can also direct your typing output to an e-mail message, Facebook page or Twitter update. And you can rotate the phone to get the widescreen keyboard, if you prefer. (Similar for Android phones: Droid Text’n’Walk, $4.)

MIFI.

It’s not often a company invents an entire new category with one fell press release, but that’s what Novatel did. The MiFi ($100 from Verizon or Sprint; monthly fee required) is a tiny, credit card-size, personal, portable, powerful, password-protected wireless hot spot. That’s right: you now have a Wi-Fi hot spot in your pocket, purse or laptop bag.

In many ways, it’s better than those U.S.B. cellular modems that jack into your laptop. On the MiFi, five people can connect at once. There’s nothing to connect or disconnect and store. And the MiFi can handle more things than laptops; Wi-Fi netbooks, cameras, game gadgets, iPhones and iPod Touches can get online, too.

SAMSUNG DUAL-SCREEN CAMERA

The front of Samsung’s DualView TL220/TL225 ($300/$350) looks completely shiny and black. But when you tap the empty spot next to the lens, a small screen lights up, right there on the front of the camera.

Having a front screen is great for framing self-portraits, for letting your subjects see what they are going to look like, for displaying a self-timer countdown, or for displaying a happy face as a “Smile!” cue when you’re taking a group photo. The screen can also display a choice of cartoon animations that keep younger subjects riveted, smiling and facing the camera. The camera itself isn’t so great, photographically speaking. But what a great idea.

NIKON PROJECTOR CAM

You can’t mention great camera feature ideas of 2009 without bringing up Nikon’s Coolpix S1000pj ($430). It’s another so-so pocket camera with a killer hidden feature: a built-in projector.

When you want to show your pictures or videos to friends, no longer must you crowd them around the camera’s little built-in screen. Now, with a single button press on the top of the camera, you can turn on the projector. The image is beamed straight from the front of the camera onto a wall, a ceiling or a friend’s T-shirt. Nobody’s going to confuse the image (40 inches, max) with an Imax movie. But especially when the lights are low and the wall is nearby, the projected image is perfectly adequate and really something to see.

BING POP-UP PREVIEWS

The actual search results from Microsoft’s new Bing.com service may not always be as good as Google’s. But Bing has a few incredibly juicy features, like the one that lets you point to any search result in the list without clicking. A popup balloon shows you the first few paragraphs of text on it. Without leaving the results list, you know if it’s going to be helpful. You really miss this trick when you return to Google, where you have to click a link to see what’s behind it.

PALM PRE DATA CONSOLIDATION

Palm’s latest app phones, the Palm Pre and Palm Pixi, offer a software trick that’s satisfying both in concept and execution: it consolidates the different sources of your life’s information.

For example, you get to see the appointments from your online Google or Yahoo Calendar, your Outlook work calendar and your Facebook events, all on a single color-coded calendar. Ditto with your various online address books, your various e-mail accounts and your various chat program buddy lists. Simple is a good thing; we like simple.

FIND MY PHONE.

Your cellphone, obviously, knows where it is, especially if it’s a model that has built-in GPS functions. So why do we wind up losing our cellphones so often?

That’s the question that Apple answered with its Find My iPhone feature, an incredibly useful aspect of its $100-a-year MobileMe service. On the me.com Web site, with a click you can see where your iPhone is on a zoomable map.

If it’s just lying in your house somewhere, the Web site lets you make it beep loudly for two minutes, so you can hunt it down among the couch cushions. If the phone is in the hands of some stranger, you can make the phone display a message (say, “Return my phone! It’s covered with deadly germs!”) or even erase the thing completely by remote control, so at least your personal life is protected.

The only thing that could be better than Find My iPhone would be a free version. That’s what you get with certain Motorola phones, like the Droid and Cliq. May this one catch on with every phone company.

READABILITY

The single best tech idea of 2009, though, the real life-changer, has got to be Readability. It’s a free button for your Web browser’s toolbar (get it at lab.arc90.com/experiments/readability). When you click it, Readability eliminates everything from the Web page you’re reading except the text and photos. No ads, blinking, links, banners, promos or anything else. Times Square just goes away.

You wind up with a simple, magazine-like layout, presented in a beautiful font and size (your choice) against a white or off-white background with none of this red-text-against-black business.

You occasionally run into a Web page that Readability doesn’t handle right — no big deal, just refresh the page to see the original. But most of the time, Readability makes the world online a calmer, cleaner, more beautiful place.

New York Times, David Pogue

Two Tons of Confetti !

Two tons of confetti descended from the sky at midnight, showering Time Square partiers.

The police department estimated that about a million people gathered at Times Square to watch the ball drop.

Best Freeware of 2009

Why pay for software when there are so many amazing free apps?

Also, there's a site to share your favorites at a special posting site on PC Mag's blog, Your Favorite Free Software.

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App Launchers

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1. Circle Dock
circledock.wikidot.com
Windows
Who says a dock has to actually... dock? To the side of the screen, that is. Circle Dock brings up a spiraling launcher interface with all the icons you want to click. Rotate it with the wheel on your mouse and change the skin to suit your desktop.

2. ObjectDock
www.stardock.com
Windows
Replace the Windows Taskbar and Quick Launch toolbar with this Mac-like animated toolbar of icons for all your programs. It comes with a few "docklets" for displaying info like the time, weather, and a Web search form.

3. Launchy
www.launchy.net
Windows | Linux
"Keystroke launcher" is a fancy way of saying "command line," but if you like to type rather than click for control—a practice that goes well beyond app launching—Launchy is your best choice.

4. Quicksilver
www.blacktree.com
Mac OS
Quicksilver does more from the keyboard than just launch programs. It can act on any item you can find or drag on your Mac. Quicksilver plug-ins add even more functions.

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Audio/Music

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5. Audacity [HALL OF FAME]
audacity.sourceforge.net
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
On a par with any commercial audio editor, Audacity is the free sound editor of choice. The latest beta (1.3.6) even supports MPEG-4, Dolby Digital, and Windows Media.

6. Banshee
banshee-project.org
Linux
iTunes is riffed upon again, this time in a Linux-only option that supports audio and video, Android phones, and older iPods (but not iPhones or iPod touch... for now).

7. EphPod
www.ephpod.com
Windows
It does whatever iTunes does in Windows—syncing, playlists, iPod firmware updates, and much more, including moving music from an iPod to your new PC.

8. foobar2000
www.foobar2000.org
Windows
Basic playback of just about any audio you can imagine is foobar2000's calling card, complete with an iTunes-like interface.

9. imeem (formerly Anywhere.FM)
www.imeem.com
Web
If iTunes were entirely in the cloud, it would be pretty close to imeem (formerly Anywhere.FM). Upload your music collection and videos to stream from any device. Digital photos, too. You can share them with friends you make on the service.

10. iTunes [HALL OF FAME]
www.apple.com/itunes
Windows | Mac OS
Do we have to explain iTunes as the (so far) ultimate media player, coupled with online store and the primary way to get media—from music to video to games to podcasts, which plays most file formats (except, unsurprisingly, Windows Media formats)—and puts them on your iPod or iPhone? Probably not.

11. Mojo
www.deusty.com
Windows | Mac OS
When you and some friends install Mojo, you're ready for a unique sharing experience. Browsing and downloading MP3s from each other's iTunes music libraries is suddenly a very easy proposition. If it's a DRM file from the iTunes store, Mojo highlights them in red so you won't be bothered trying.

12. Songbird
www.getsongbird.com
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
Mozilla's knockoff of iTunes is free, open-source, and supports just about every kind of music file you can imagine. You can even download embedded MP3s on Web sites to your permanent collection. Extensions add support for iPods and Web services.

13. Screamer Radio
www.screamer-radio.com
Windows
You can download an app or run it from the Web, but either way, Screamer Radio accesses and lets you record Internet radio in a number of streaming audio formats (Shoutcast, Icecast, Ogg Vorbis, WMA, and AAC).

14. WavePad Sound Editor
www.nch.com.au/wavepad
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
WavePad puts all the usual bells and whistles of audio editing and effects at your fingertips.

15. Winamp [HALL OF FAME]
www.winamp.com
Windows
Still a primo MP3 player, Winamp is both customizable (it heralded the age of "skins" on software) and comes in multiple versions, including one that works with CDs.

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Backup

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16. DriveImage XML
www.runtime.org
Windows
Make a replica—an image—of your entire hard drive for easy backup and restore later.

17. MozBackup
mozbackup.jasnapaka.com
Windows
If you're a big user of Mozilla products—including Firefox, Thunderbird, and SeaMonkey, as well as Flock and Netscape—use MozBackup to store your hard-earned settings and data like bookmarks and e-mail messages.

18. MozyHome Free
www.mozy.com
Windows | Mac OS
Don't even think about backing up: MozyHome will do it for you, in the background, for up to 2GB of data (you can pay to get unlimited space). Perfect for office docs, but you'll want to pay for more storage to back up pictures, music, or videos. Soon it will sync between PCs, too.

19. SpiderOak
www.spideroak.com
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
It's another 2GB of free online storage that backs up in the background, but SpiderOak goes Mozy one better by supporting Linux.

20. SyncToy v2.0
www.microsoft.com/downloads
Windows
This so-called PowerToy from Microsoft has the power to make sure folders across your multiple drives or even your home network stay fully synchronized.

21. SyncBack Freeware
www.2brightsparks.com/freeware
Windows
Set all the parameters and SyncBack will handle synchronization or backup between folders, FTP sites, or ZIP archives.

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Blogging

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22. ScribeFire
www.scribefire.com
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
This add-on for Firefox is a perfect tool for posting entries to just about any blogging software or service in existence.

23. TweetDeck
www.tweetdeck.com
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
Don't restrict Twitter to just a column when this Adobe Air–based software can spread itself across your desktop with multiple columns. Each column can contain replies, direct messages, or whatever you specify. As with any tweet tool, the columns auto-update as new tweets arrive. TweetDeck stores all tweets that arrive while the app is running so you don't miss anything overnight.

24. Twitteriffic
www.iconfactory.com/software/twitterrific
Mac OS| Mobile
A small desktop footprint is the hallmark of this reverse-type Twitter app, great for reading and posting to the popular microblogging service. All the features you expect, and more, are there—even in the free version, which includes advertisements.

25. Zoundry Raven
www.zoundryraven.com
Windows
Finally, standalone software that gives Windows Live Writer some serious competition for the pro bloggers. It handles full WYSIWYG editing on multiple blogs and can run portably from a USB flash drive to use with any Windows PC.

26. twhirl
www.twhirl.org
Windows | Mac OS
A desktop interface for Twitter, twhirl requires Adobe AIR to run but makes it infinitely easier to keep up with tweets and/or twits.

27. Ustream.tv
www.ustream.tv
Web
Still the best way to broadcast yourself, live, across the Web. All you need is the webcam.

28. WordPress.com
www.wordpress.com
Web
You could install WordPress on your servers, or go right to this commercial, hosted site and set up a professional-looking blog in no time.
Read our review of WordPress.

29. Windows Live Writer
get.live.com/writer/overview
Windows
This desktop software for blog posting is a favorite with the pros who want a WYSIWYG editor that also posts photos, maps, and other content.

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Browsers

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30. Camino
caminobrowser.org
Mac OS
Love Firefox but wish it was more ... Mac-ish? Camino solves that issue, offering "Mozilla power, Mac style." It has full support of Mac OS's Keychain, AppleScript, and all the typical Firefox goodies.

31. Flock 2
www.flock.com
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
Flock 2 stresses the social along with surfing, integrating features like RSS reading and Twitter and media access right into the browser. Since it's based on Firefox, it can also use many of the same extensions.
Read our review of Flock 2.

32. Firefox [HALL OF FAME]
www.mozilla.com
Windows | Mac OS | Linux | Mobile
Can't wait for the free update to IE8, which promises an enhanced address bar and upgraded privacy protections? In the meantime use our favorite browser. Firefox is beholden to no one and extensible to the nth degree. Upcoming versions will offer far more security and superfast JavaScript to make the browsing experience even better.
Read our review of Firefox 3, a PCMag Editors' Choice.

33. FoxReplace
code.google.com/p/foxreplace
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
If you work in a lot of Web forms or Web apps like Google Docs, this Firefox add-on is a must-have. It can search and replace text in Web pages quickly and easily.

34. Google Chrome
www.google.com/chrome
Windows
Everyone pays attention to what Google does, and when it made a Web browser, the world noticed. And for good reason: This streamlined, fast, secure software has true potential in the browser wars.

35. Internet Explorer 8 Beta [HALL OF FAME]
www.microsoft.com/windows/internet-explorer
Windows
This is a freebie you're probably already using in some form, as IE is the most-used Web browser in the world. The latest beta adds fantastic (if overdue) features such as a stealth mode, better performance, and the ability to subscribe to "web slices" that are just parts of a full Web page.

36. Opera [HALL OF FAME]
www.opera.com
Windows | Mac OS | Linux | Mobile
Opera can claim many "firsts"—tabs, speed dial, and more—and some say the best. It remains a fast browser with a presence available on just about any device in your digital arsenal.
Read our review of Opera 9.

37. OperaTor
archetwist.com/en/opera/operator
Windows
Combine the portable version of Opera with the anonymizing service Tor (The Onion Router) and you get OperaTor, a bundle (including Polipo as a proxy) that keeps your surfing secret.

38. Safari
www.apple.com/safari
Windows | Mac OS
Fast page load times are a hallmark of this browser, the default for Mac installations and also available for Windows. Safari offered private browsing before it was cool.
Read our review of Safari 3.1 for Windows.

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Calendar/PIMs

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39. 30 Boxes
www.30boxes.com
www.30boxes.com
An online calendar that actually looks like a calendar. The buddies feature makes sharing schedules and to-dos a breeze.

40. Calgoo Calendar
www.calgoo.com/calendar
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
Think of Calgoo as one calendar app to rule them all: The software provides desktop access to Google Calendar and 30 Boxes, and syncs data with Outlook and Apple iCal.

41. Doomi
doominow.com
Windows
This simple to-do list app requires Adobe Air to run, and floats on your screen or rests in the system tray—the very model of an unobtrusive application. Future plans include syncing with an online to-do list.

42. Google Calendar
www.google.com/calendar
Web | Mobile
With multiple views, simple sharing, and seamless integration with other Google products, Google's calendar, like most of its Web apps, stands a notch above the rest.
Read the full review of Google Calendar.

43. Lightning
www.mozilla.org/projects/calendar/lightning
Windows | Mac OS | Linux | Solaris | OS2
Mozilla's calendar add-on for Thunderbird gives the e-mail client all it needs to take on all the features of Microsoft Outlook.

44. Chandler
chandlerproject.org
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
An open-source, sharable desktop to-do master, Chandler looks vaguely Outlook-esque, but it doesn't worry about communications—just tasks for those embracing the "getting things done" lifestyle.

45. Remember The Milk
www.rememberthemilk.com
Web | Mobile
This power to-do list site gives you many ways to get reminders (e-mail, SMS, IM) and even more ways to create them, from Google widgets to phone calls to IM bots.

46. Remember The Task
www.jashsayani.com/my-softwares
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
This Adobe Air–based app puts a small window on your desktop with one fantastic purpose: full-time access to your Remember The Milk task list.

47. TaskFive
www.taskfive.com
Web
Just five tasks a day? Take it as a challenge, not a limitation. TaskFive sports an elegant calendar interface, and you can enter tasks via Web, e-mail, or text message. Team to-dos will cost you, however.

48. Yahoo Calendar
calendar.yahoo.com
Web
An old-timer compared with many, Yahoo Calendar doesn't innovate a lot but provides solid features, shareable calendars, and synchronization with Outlook.

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Communication/E-Mail

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49. eM Client
www.emclient.com
Windows
Anyone familiar with Outlook or Thunderbird can master the basics of using eM Client freeware in no time. It already syncs with Google Calendar, and future developments will integrate social networks and IMs with your e-mail.

50. Gmail
www.gmail.com
Web | Mobile
The current bellwether in Web-based e-mail is still in perennial beta, but Google continues to innovate with additions via the Gmail Labs. The searchable and ever-increasing storage (up to 7GB now, up from 5.5GB last year) doesn't hurt. New themes make it pretty. And you can use it to IM or even send SMS text messages to friends' phones.

51. gAttach
www.gattach.net
Windows
Usually with webmail, you have to put attachments on a message after the fact. gAttach does it automatically when you select a file, or from within other apps like MS Word, all from the desktop. If you prefer Yahoo Mail, check out yAttach.

52. Google Contacts
hogi.a.orn.jp/en/gmcont.html
Windows
This extension for Thunderbird does one thing you need: It synchronizes contacts between Thunderbird and Google's Gmail.

53. iContact
www.dataload.com/icontact
Windows
Accessing your Gmail contacts is all the easier with iContact; it displays the normally browser-accessible-only list on your desktop and integrates those contacts into other communications software, like Skype.

54. Simple Mail
www.userlogos.org/extensions/simplemail
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
If you already have Firefox open all the time, why not have one of those tabs just for mail? The Simple Mail add-on puts a POP3/IMAP client right inside the browser.

55. Thunderbird [HALL OF FAME]
www.mozilla.com/thunderbird
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
The Internet's top e-mail client from Mozilla is (of course) extensible, but even without add-ons Thunderbird is simple-to-master software for anyone with a POP3 or IMAP e-mail account.
Read our review of Thunderbird 2.

56. Windows Live Mail
get.live.co
Windows
Outlook Express has morphed into the modern-day Live Mail, ready to check POP3, IMAP, and webmail accounts when you're not using it to read RSS feeds or plan your calendar.
Read our review of Windows Live Mail (Wave 3).

57. Yahoo Mail
mail.yahoo.com
Web
Our webmail Editors' Choice embeds the Yahoo Messenger IM and RSS reader, works on the Web with any browser or operating system, and has more features than anyone could hope to master.
Read our review of Yahoo Mail, a PCMag.com Editors' Choice.

58. Zenbe
www.zenbe.com
Web
Zenbe is a multi-account, Internet-based interface to check Yahoo Mail, Gmail, AOL, Windows Live, and POP3 messages. It throws in a shareable calendar, an address book, and other tools to make it extra-useful.

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Conferencing

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59. Dabbleboard
www.dabbleboard.com
Web
As simple as any whiteboard in a conference room, Dabbleboard's online app brings drawing and some real-time collaboration to your group.

60. SightSpeed
www.sightspeed.com
Windows | Mac OS
Now owned by Logitech, SightSpeed provides one-on-one video chat with unparalleled video quality, but more than two users at a time will cost you.
Read our full review of SightSpeed 6.0, a PCMag.com Editors' Choice .

61. Skype
www.skype.com
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
Easy to use for phone calls (free between Skype users, with a minimal charge to call other phones), Skype truly shines when paired with a high-end webcam so you can see your friends and family.
Read our full review of Skype.

62. Tokbox
www.tokbox.com
Web
The Tokbox service turns your AIM buddy list into a videoconferencing buddy list directly in your browser. Separate apps make it work through Facebook or on your desktop. You provide the camera.
Read our full review of TokBox AIR.

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File Transfer/Download

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63. CrossFTP
www.crossftp.com
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
Built on Java, CrossFTP works and looks the same, no matter which OS you run. It features tabs for each connection, support for archives, and drag-and-drop transfer, and it comes in a free server version, too.

64. DownThemAll
www.downthemall.net
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
Don't download just one item at a time from a Web page. As the name implies, this download manager for Firefox handles them all.

65. Filezilla
www.filezilla-project.org
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
Slick and simple FTP that does the job, complete with drag-and-drop from local to remote or vice versa.

66. FireFTP
fireftp.mozdev.org
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
Because it's a plug-in for Firefox, FireFTP behaves like any other tab in the browser, so you don't have to launch another application to transfer files.

67. Halite
www.binarynotions.com/halite-bittorrent-client
Windows
Instead of downloading an entire file, apps using the super-popular BitTorrent protocol break files into chunks and distribute them among several users. Free, open-source application Halite is a BitTorrent client focused on using as small of a memory footprint as possible.

68. net2ftp
www.net2ftp.com
Web
If you sit at a computer with no FTP software but need to upload a file, stat, this Web app comes to your rescue quickly as long as you have the server, username, and password information.

69. Rightload
www.rightload.org
Windows
Send a file to preconfigured FTP servers anytime you want with a simple right click. Rightload adds just a single line to the context menu, with fly-out menus for each FTP server you want

70. uTorrent
www.utorrent.com
Windows
Still the best—and smallest—BitTorrent client in existence, uTorrent will have you downloading big files in no time.

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File Viewers/Converters

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71. Adobe Reader [HALL OF FAME]
www.adobe.com/reader
Windows | Mac OS | Linux | Mobile
Adobe's PDF reader is far from basic, with a number of extra features including online collaboration tools.

72. Foxit Reader
www.foxitsoftware.com
Windows | Linux | Mobile
Frequently preferred over Adobe's own reader for PDFs, Foxit has a reputation for speed. What's more, it can annotate files.

73. PeaZip
peazip.sourceforge.net
Windows | Linux
It'll create ZIPs, 7Zs, TARs, ARCs, and more; it'll open those and many other archives too, including RAR. It can do so with AES encryption of your files, and even split or join extralarge files to make them easier to transport.

74. Sumatra PDF
blog.kowalczyk.info/software/sumatrapdf
Windows
The perfect PDF reader for the minimalist, with a super-simple interface and fast start-up time. Sumatra is perfect to carry on a USB thumb drive.

75. Quick Media Converter (QMC)
www.cocoonsoftware.com
Windows
If you're frequently converting audio or video files to different formats, keep this tool handy for (as the name suggests) quick media conversion to a number of potential formats.

76. WinRAR
www.rarlab.com
Windows
We all know about compressing files with ZIP, but RAR is also quite popular; WinRAR will compress or decompress files in both.

77. YemuZip
www.yellowmug.com/yemuzip
Mac OS
Sometimes unzipping a compressed file on the Mac makes a mess. YemuZip makes archiving and decompressing a simple drag-and-drop procedure.

78. Zamzar
www.zamzar.com
Web
Upload just about any file (under 100MB) and you can convert it to just about any format that makes sense. This tool even grabs online videos from YouTube and turns them into files you can use.

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Finance

---

79. Billeo
www.billeo.com
Windows
Install the Billeo toolbar on your Web browser and add your accounts, and you'll get fast access to assistance with online shopping, online bill payment, and reports on your spending.
Read our review of Billeo, a PCMag.com Editors' Choice.

80. Buxfer
www.buxfer.com
Web | Mobile
Sign up (or use an existing AOL, Facebook, Google, OpenID, or Yahoo account) to get started with tracking shared expenses, so divvying up the bills at the end of the month becomes a breeze.

81. Mint
www.mint.com
Web
Mint manages your money by sucking in data from all your bank, credit card, and other accounts, providing you regular reports on what you're spending and how to save.
Read our review of Mint.com, a PCMag.com Editors' Choice.

82. Wesabe
www.wesabe.com
Windows | Mac OS | Web
"Part money management tool, part community," where info—your comments about your spending—is shared (anonymously) with the group so everyone can find value. Of course, Wesabe also helps track your spending and income.

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Fun/Home

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83. eBay Desktop
desktop.ebay.com
Windows | Mac OS
This app, which requires Adobe Air, looks like eBay replicated on your desktop, but for power buyers it adds special functions, like not needing to refresh the page and a clock synchronized with eBay's own.

84. Geni.com
www.geni.com
Web
There's no easier place to plug in your family tree, and being a Web app makes it easy to share with the rest of the family so they can fill in the gaps.

85. Google Earth
earth.google.com
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
If you like Google Maps online, welcome to that same kind of action on steroids. You can traverse the globe on its interlocking satellite images, or reverse it and look skyward, even travel to the past. Third-party add-ons continue to extend Google Earth's capabilities beyond what our puny terrestrial minds can imagine.
Read our review of Google Earth 4.3, a PCMag.com Editors' Choice.

86. Home Inventory
www.knowyourstuff.org
Windows | Mac OS
Insurance companies ask you to inventory your possessions prior to signing up for a homeowner's or renter's policy. Create a home inventory of everything you own on this site, a service of the Insurance Information Institute, and throw in digital pictures or even scanned purchase receipts to make sure what's yours is yours.

87. Penzu
www.penzu.com
Web
Hard to believe that in the age of blogging, some people still want journals and diaries they keep to themselves. Penzu is all about making that happen, online, with privacy as the first priority.

88. Springpad
www.springpadit.com
Web
Manage your life tasks with online notebooks filled with lists, photos, notes, and maps/directions you can share with the whole family. Perfect for tracking receipts, planning meals or trips, and getting your house organized.

89. Timetoast
www.timetoast.com
Web
Ever wanted to create a timeline for your site or a presentation, but couldn't decide what tool would best display the data? Wonder no more, as Timetoast adds this useful data with an attractive flair.

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Graphics

---

90. Artweaver
www.artweaver.de
Windows
If you want the freedom to paint, without the mess and without paying $359 for Corel Painter X, Artweaver is a good starter tool for artists.

91. DestroyFlickr
www.destroytoday.com/?p=Project&id=DestroyFlickr
Windows
This Adobe Air app puts Flickr on your desktop, but with a completely different interface. Why "destroy"? In the words of app creator Jonnie Hallman, "To destroy today is to make the most of the day—destruction as a form of creation."

92. flauntR
www.flauntr.com
Web
This online photo editor integrates with just about any picture service you can imagine, including Facebook and Flickr, and offers a suite of tools to manipulate images in ways specific to social networks and mobile handsets.

93. FastStone Image Viewer
www.faststone.org
Windows
Another image browser and converter that handles almost any file type, FastStone also has companion programs like the handy Photo Resizer, complete with a fast batch processor.

94. GIMP [HALL OF FAME]
www.gimp.org

GNU Image Manipulation Program (GIMP) has provided Photoshop-like tools at no charge for over a decade.
Read our review of Gimp 2.4.7 .

95. Google SketchUp
sketchup.google.com
Windows | Mac OS
If you're new to 3D but want to build worlds anyway, a free tool like SketchUp is a great place to start; the latest version includes "self-aware" 3D models so the app knows, for example, to resize a virtual staircase by adding more stairs and extend a virtual fence by adding more slats.
Read our review of Google SketchUp.

96. IrfanView
www.irfanview.com
Windows
Perhaps the ultimate image viewer (with some editing tools thrown in), the latest IrfanView (version 4.20) received a nice cosmetic update. It also supports instant video and audio playback.
Read our review of IrfanView 3.85, a PCMag.com Editors' Choice.

97. Paint.NET
www.getpaint.net
Windows
This student project–turned–freeware masterpiece puts the power of higher-end graphics editors in anyone's hands.

98. Pencil
www.les-stooges.org/pascal/pencil
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
For the budding Chuck Jones at home, Pencil is a free way to get started in the world of traditional 2D animation–that is, draw each frame anew.

99. Picasa
picasa.google.com
Windows | Linux
Few free programs come close to handling photos with the skill of Picasa. Organize them, do quick edits (including red-eye reduction), and share pics online or e-mail them to friends.
Read our review of Picasa 3, a PCMag.com Editors' Choice.

100. MobaPhoto
mobaphoto-en.mobatek.net
Windows
Portability is the key here. This lightweight photo editor (only 1.6MB) puts photographs into great-looking photo galleries, and naturally has all the usual tools to fix red-eye, crop, and resize. It'll even batch-process images.

101. Photoshop Express
www.photoshop.com/express
Web
It's not the full power of Photoshop on the Web, but it does offer rudimentary editing, basic photo sharing, and 2GB of storage for your photos. Partnerships with sites like Picasa and Facebook make Photoshop Express fun as well as useful.
Read our review of Photoshop Express .

102. Photosynth
www.photosynth.com
Web
Photosynth does so many unique things with photos that we gave it a Technical Excellence award. It takes multiple photos, finds where they overlap, and creates an almost 3D image; it can even make a 3D replica of an object from shots at multiple angles.

103. Picnik
www.picnik.com
Web
Picnik is the gold standard in online image editing these days: It fixes photos without confusing users and works with a number of photo-sharing sites, and best of all, you don't have to register to get started using it—unless you want to save images online.
Read our review of Picnik.

104. Pictomio
www.pictomio.com
Windows
Handling all your photos with a simple but powerful interface, Pictomio browses in many styles—including a carousel mode similar to iTunes' Coverflow, which benefits from a good 3D video card—organizes shots, and creates instant slideshows. It will even handle audio and video.

105. Splashup
www.splashup.com
Web
You don't even need to sign up to get instant access to this Flash-based image editor with all the features (and more) that you'd find in a downloadable app.

106. SUMO Paint
www.sumo.fi/web
Web
Not every Web-based image editor can claim to be high-end, but SUMO can by carefully mimicking the look and feel of Photoshop, maybe a little too well. Try it before this free Flash app gets sued out of existence by Adobe.

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IMs

---

107. AIM [HALL OF FAME]
www.aim.com
Windows | Mac OS | Linux | Web | Mobile
AOL's Instant Messenger is the most-used network in the U.S., and the software—only the Windows version gets regular updates these days—packs in as much as possible. You can access the AIM network with just about any multi-protocol IM software.
Read our review of AIM 6.5 .

108. Dexrex
www.dexrex.com
Windows | Mac OS | Mobile
This add-on records your IM conversation transcripts and stores them online for later reading and analysis. It works with AIM,Digsby, Yahoo Messenger, and many others.

109. Digsby
www.digsby.com
Windows
Brand new this year, Digsby may be the ultimate way to stay in real-time touch with friends. It incorporates multiple IM networks, social networks (including Twitter), and e-mail and Web-mail notifications. You can even send mail through Digsby. Mac OS and Linux versions are promised soon.

110. Meebo
www.meebo.com
Web | Mobile
When you want to avoid installing software but still want to chat on all the major IM networks, Meebo is your site of choice. Sign up for a Meebo account to access multiple IM networks all at once and log all conversations.
Read our review of Meebo.

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Interface Enhancers

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111. AccelMan File Manager
www.flexigensoft.com/accelman
Windows
As much a file viewer as a file manager, AccelMan's multiple windows offer up info galore on each file and its contents. The app can even play back media files when you don't want to launch another player.

112. Desktops
technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/cc817881.aspx
Windows
Desktops is a virtual desktop manager in a small package; the app is only a 62K download. Personalize hotkeys for quick switches between desktops.

113. DExposE2
devrexster.googlepages.com/dexpose2
Windows
This app is a Windows clone of the Mac interface treat Exposé, which makes opening and closing apps and getting to the desktop a fast process. Windows XP and Vista users can also set up DExposE2 to work on multiple monitors.

114. Emerge Desktop
emergedesktop.org
Windows
You think the Windows desktop looks too busy with that system tray, Taskbar, and Start button? EmergeDesktop does away with them all, replacing the Windows shell (the interface, that is) with the minuscule emergeTray. Launch apps with a right click, or couple Emerge Desktop with a launcher like ObjectDock.

115. GreenPrint
www.printgreener.com
Windows | Mac OS
Stop printing that extra blank page when you need a hard copy of a Web page, or for any printout. GreenPrint saves the paper, even letting you output a PDF sans the blank sheets. A tree somewhere will thank you.
Read our review of GreenPrint .

116. muCommander
www.mucommander.com
Windows | Mac OS | Linux | Mobile
muCommander is unique: It's a file manager that looks the same on all operating systems. A standard dual-pane, it also has support for archived files, FTPs, and previews files.

117. PlacesBar Tweaker
www.ioisland.com/placesbar
Windows
Every time you open or save a file in Windows XP, the dialog box gives you a few select options, like Desktop or My Documents, to choose from in the Places bar. You can personalize that list with this tweaker, putting your most-used folders in the lineup.

118. RBTray
moitah.net
Windows
RBTray does one thing and does it well: It makes it possible to minimize any application you like to the system tray as an icon, rather than as a taskbar button, without even doing a full install (RBTray can run from a thumb drive).

119. StandaloneStack
www.chrisnsoft.com/standalonestack
Windows
Mac OS X Leopard introduced cool towers of icons to the interface, with shortcuts to frequently accessed folders, called stacks. Now you can put stacks in Windows as well. There's even an add-on to put stacks on the RocketDock launcher.

120. Start++
www.brandontools.com/content/StartPlusPlus.aspx
Windows
A nice addition in Vista to the Windows environment was the Start Menu's search box. Start++ turbocharges it with extras like online searches with results in the menu, and its own set of widgets and plug-ins (for example, displaying the weather is an option).

121. TrayEverything
www.winapizone.net/software/trayeverything
Windows
You've got a lot of applications open, but only so much space in your Taskbar... so why not minimize them directly to the system tray on the lower right-hand side of your screen? TrayEverything will do it for you.

122. UltraExplorer
www.mustangpeak.net/ultraexplorer.html
Windows
Another replacement for Windows Explorer, this one sports a command-line interface to go with the dual-pane view of files, plus a preview window so you can quickly check the contents of a file before opening it.

123. Yahoo Widgets
widgets.yahoo.com
Windows | Mac OS
The world's biggest collection of widgets—over 5,000 of the things—is yours through Yahoo. Some are more useful than others, but with the right combo your desktop can be an information powerhouse.

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Local Search

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124. Google Desktop
desktop.google.com
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
Put the power of Google's search engine to work on finding your own files. The software indexes in the background, while in the foreground you get to put all the Google Gadgets (widgets) you like on your desktop.
Read our review of Google Desktop 4 (beta).

125. Everything
www.voidtools.com
Windows
Don't need the extras? Everything really does just one thing in its small package: It indexes your PC in real time for lightning-fast search.

126. Locate32
www.locate32.net
Windows
The Locate32 project is all about indexing the contents of your hard drives and other storage to run fast finds on local data.

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Office

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127. Adobe Buzzword
www.buzzword.com
Web
This online-only word processor has one of the best-looking minimalist interfaces going, since it was built entirely with Adobe Flash, and each page looks as good as any formatted in Word.
Read our review of Adobe Buzzword .

128. blist
www.blist.com
Web
Web lists (aka "blists") are little databases for all your data needs. The Flash interface makes this fast for newbies and powerful enough for everyone else. You can even put your blists on your blog or social network pages.

129. EtherPad
etherpad.com
Web
You don't even have to sign up to create a new pad, a shareable text document stored online for you by EtherPad. Don't expect fancy formatting, but do expect real-time, color-coded editing between all collaborators.

130. Evernote
www.evernote.com
Windows | Mac OS | Mobile | Web
Take a clipping of anything you see—online or off—for later reference. Built-in OCR makes text inside images searchable.

131. GMDesk
www.robertnyman.com/gmdesk/
Windows
Bring Google's Web apps to the desktop with this site-specific browser interface that requires Adobe Air. You'll have access to Gmail, Google Reader, and Google Docs just as you would in a browser, but GMDesk stays alive when your browser crashes.

132. Google Docs
docs.google.com
Web | Mobile
If you're ready to move your work life to the cloud, Google's word processor, spreadsheet, and presentation suite is ready for you, complete with storage for all docs. It also comes with forms you can fill out to gather data from outside.
Read our review of Google Docs, a PCMag.com Editors' Choice.

133. Incollector
www.incollector.devnull.pl
Windows | Linux
Note-taking doesn't have to hog the whole desktop, or even the whole browser window. Incollector runs in the background, letting you call up a new note page from the system tray when you want, tag it, and easily find it later.

134. Jarte
www.jarte.com
Windows
No one loves the Notepad included in Windows, and there are many replacements. Jarte goes most of them one better, being completely self-contained and portable (you can run it from a thumb drive!).

135. KompoZer
www.kompozer.net
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
This free WYSIWYG Web page authoring package builds on the abandoned Nvu project. It supports CSS, file management (including FTP), and tabs for multiple pages.

136. Lotus Symphony
symphony.lotus.com
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
IBM's entry into the world of office suites is based on OpenOffice, and is currently in beta for Mac and Linux. It covers the three big suite tools: word processing, presentations, and spreadsheets.
Read our review of Lotus Symphony .

137. LucidChart
www.lucidchart.com
Web
Why make flowcharts complicated? This Web app goes back to basics with simple, black-and-white charts that anyone can make—and better yet, anyone else can easily understand.

138. NeoOffice
www.neooffice.com
Mac OS
NeoOffice comes with most of the same tools as the Mac version of OpenOffice but carries a more Apple-friendly look and feel.

139. Notepad++ [HALL OF FAME]
notepad-plus.sourceforge.net
Windows
Notepad++ is the standard by which all replacements for Notepad—that weak little app that comes with Windows—are measured. It sports full text styles, tabs, drag-and-drop, and super-speed and is suitable for any coding or writing you can throw at it.

140. OpenOffice [HALL OF FAME]
www.openoffice.org
Windows | Mac OS | Linux | Solaris
Version 3 of the freebie office suite ups the ante against Microsoft's hegemony, becoming fast and polished enough to warrant serious consideration by all, especially small businesses. It looks like MS Office 2003 (for those not in love with the Ribbon interface in Office 2007) and has all the tools—except e-mail—you'll ever need.
Read our Review of OpenOffice.org 3.0 .

141. SlideRocket
www.sliderocket.com
Web
Promising more than PowerPoint and Keynote is bold, but this Web-only presentation tool seems to deliver the goods with amazing animations, support for embedded video, and 3D transitions between slides.

142. SoftMaker Office 2006
www.softmakeroffice.com
Windows
This free version is meant to entice you to upgrade to the 2008 version, but if all you need is basic text editing and a spreadsheet, you're set.

143. Springnote
www.springnote.com
Web | Mobile
Whether you want a personal notebook or a shareable group notebook, this wiki-based note-taking site could give Microsoft's OneNote a run for its money.

144. Widgenie
www.widgenie.com
Web
Sick of making meh-looking graphs in Excel? Visualize the same data through Widgenie and create a beautiful graph widget, even one with animation, that you can share online. Text clouds, artful presentations of the most popular words on a page, are always a favorite with bloggers.

145. Zoho
www.zoho.com
Web | Mobile
If there's a tool in the arsenal of office suites that Zoho doesn't include, we can't think of it. Not all the Web apps are free, but those that are—word processor, spreadsheet tool, presentation app, mail, wiki, and many more—all bring the goods.
Read our review of Zoho .

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Operating Systems

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146. gOS 3.0 Gadgets
www.thinkgos.com
Linux
With its emphasis on easy access to tools from Google, it's easy to see why some think of this lightweight Linux—renowned for powering cheap PCs from Wal-Mart—as the Google OS.

147. pure:dyne
code.goto10.org/projects/puredyne
Linux
Consider this the creative Linux distro: Boot just about any Intel PC (even MacBooks) from a Live CD with pure:dyne, and you'll get instant access to free tools for editing audio, video, and images (many already in this story).

148. Ubuntu [HALL OF FAME]
www.ubuntu.com
Linux
The easiest Linux to install, now in version 8.10 (aka "Intrepid Ibex"), not only is suitable for (somewhat knowledgeable) consumers, but also comes with all the software you need to be productive.
Read our review of Ubuntu 8.04 .

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Networking

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149. AirSnare
home.comcast.net/~jay.deboer/airsnare
Windows
Turn your Wi-Fi–equipped laptop into an info sniffer. AirSnare pulls down info on computers and game consoles and just about any device on the network, even delivering devices' MAC addresses.

150. AirRadar
www.koingosw.com/products/airradar.php
Mac OS
AirRadar goes beyond what the Wi-Fi utility in Mac OS X can do by showing extras like signal strength and the 802.11 network's channel.

151. Axence NetTools
www.axencesoftware.com
Windows
Want a quick look at everything happening on your home network? NetTools scans the network, and reports back on what ports are in use and the inbound and outbound connections. You can use it to test your networking connections over TCP or UDP protocols.

152. GBridge
www.gbridge.com
Windows
Set up a relatively painless VPN between computers for sharing and syncing files and folders, using your Google account as the connection point (though Gbridge is not affiliated with Google).

153. InSSIDer
www.metageek.net/products/inssider
Windows
Taking up where the venerable NetStumbler left off, InSSIDer is a Wi-Fi network scanner that runs under Vista and XP— even the 64-bit versions. You can use it to find out what's wrong with local 802.11 networks.

154. LogMeIn Hamachi
secure.logmein.com
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
Set up a secure tunnel between two PCs using a virtual private network (VPN), just like the ones the pros use to access the server at work. Only this one is free.
Read our review of Hamachi for Windows .

155. NetSetMan
www.netsetman.com
Windows
Stop using Vista's convoluted interface to change network settings. NetSetMan takes over and creates profiles for different networks you might connect with, changing your need for static or dynamic IPs, or hostnames or workgroups, on the fly. If you've got multiple network cards, NetSetMan is a huge help.

156. Network Notepad
www.networknotepad.com
Windows
It's more than a notepad: This software is specific to creating flowcharts of your network layout. Put in the IP address for each device and you can use the interface to quickly ping devices to confirm they're online.

157. PrinterAnywhere
www.printeranywhere.com
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
Why print just to your printer? This utility lets you print to any printer on the Internet (through another PC with PrinterAnywhere installed), or you can open your printer to others.

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RSS Readers

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158. Google Reader
reader.google.com
Web | Mobile
After three years, Google's RSS feed reader is tops, not only mimicking the best of what desktop readers can do but also mashing up nicely with other Google services, like the iGoogle home page.
Read our review of Google Reader.

159. Netvibes
www.netvibes.com
Web
A personalized start page with an emphasis on widgets and feed readers, Netvibes also aggregates podcasts for you.
Read our review of NetVibes.

160. FeedDemon
www.newsgator.com/Individuals/FeedDemon
Windows
The preeminent desktop newsreader for Windows was recently overhauled to be faster and easier, while remaining extremely customizable to suit how you read feeds.
Read our review of FeedDemon, a PCMag.com Editors' Choice.

161. NetNewsWire
www.newsgator.com/individuals/netnewswire
Mac OS | Mobile
FeedDemon's sibling on the Macintosh platform has updated its interface and more, and now integrates with several other Mac apps like iCal and iPhoto to help you share as well as read.

162. RSS Bandit
rssbandit.org
Windows
Directly sync this reader with your online feeds at Google Reader or NewsGator Online. You'll get fast browsing on the desktop, but still have access to your feeds over the Web using other PCs.

163. Snarfer
www.snarfware.com
Windows
It won't win awards for visual innovation, but Snarfer does provide simplicity. It's arguably the best way to handle straight-up RSS info gathering and reading, and it's available in over 20 languages.

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Synchronization

---

164. Dropbox
www.getdropbox.com
Windows | Mac OS | Linux | Web
One of the few sync/backup tools to support Linux (Fedora and Ubuntu), Dropbox always gets kudos for its design and simple setup. Online backup space is free for up to 2GB.

165. Windows Live Sync
sync.live.com
Windows | Mac OS | Web
The replacement for FolderShare continues to do one thing and do it well: sync folders (up to 20) across multiple PCs over the Internet.

166. Windows Live Mesh
www.mesh.com
Windows | Mac OS | Mobile | Web
Microsoft's latest method for syncing folders on different PCs does FolderShare one better by including 5GB of online storage accessible from any PC, plus the ability to mesh special collaborative applications (like a group crossword puzzle!).

167. Syncplicity
www.syncplicity.com
Windows | Mobile | Web
Synchronize up to 10,000 files (or 2GB, whichever comes first) on up to two computers free. Sign up friends and you can add another 1GB per new user recruited.

168. Mozilla Weave
services.mozilla.com
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
A product of Mozilla Labs, Weave is meant to synchronize anything and everything related to Firefox among all the computers you use, plus extend some features to others for sharing. Registration is closed as of this writing, but should be back soon.

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Video

---

169. CamStudio
www.camstudio.org
Windows
This open-source program for capturing videos of your screen turns what you do on your desktop, as well as the audio to go with it, into a movie, suitable for future demonstrations.

170. HandBrake
www.handbrake.fr
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
Want to back up all those DVDs you own before they get scratched? This open-source tool does full DVD-to-MPEG-4 conversion, which you can play back later on media centers, even the Apple TV.

171. Miro
www.getmiro.com
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
Miro's a video player that promises to play back just about any video media file, organize files in playlists, and incorporate BitTorrent downloading to become a de facto PC-based TiVo.

172. TipCam
www.utipu.com/app
Windows
Another tool for capturing videos of your desktop, TipCam lets you take big, beautiful videos (up to 800 by 600 pixels)—you can even zoom in on specifics—and upload them direct to YouTube. Frequent users can get an account to store and display up to 250MB of video.

173. VLC media player
www.videolan.org/vlc
Windows | Mac OS | Linux
VideoLAN's open-source software plays back, well, just about everything. It can also serve up streaming video and music to other PCs on your network.

The festival of free software doesn't have to end! Skim through last year's compilation of free software, or take a look at these other app collections for various other platforms.

• The Best Free Software '08

• Free iPhone apps

Also, top web sites of 2009

http://www.pcmag.com/category2/0,2806,7488,00.asp#PageContinue

http://www.pcmag.com/print_article2/0,1217,a%253D235942,00.asp

from PC magazine.