A link to an Ars Technica article on Microsoft Security Essential, free anti-virus software. The article is 6 month old, but still worth the read. Users who don’t want to pay $50 for anti-virus software should consider installing MSE.
This article is a continuation of Vanity Domain Names first posted on 3/9. In that article I discussed the reasons for having your own domain name for your website: to stand out from the Facebook crowd and to have control over your website.
In this article I will go over step 1 of the three simple steps of registering a domain name. To review, the three steps are: 1) brainstorm a list of candidate domain names, 2) check their availability, and 3) register your domain name. This is not an iterative process, because after you start looking up availability of domain names, you may come back to the drawing board to create a new list.
Happy pi day (3.14) today on March 14. For fun, can anyone produce an algorithm in any programming language to determine pi to within a second (month.day hour minute second)? First person to post with the correct answer gets a “geek-ki” t-shirt and treat I’ll bring back from Japan.
Part of our computer literacy program is to teach you at least one computer programming language, and I believe python is a good one to learn. It is simple, yet powerful, and available on any operating system. Kids will get the most benefits because they can also learn to program python for math and science!
By the way, you get the other geeky humor today? Pi, python, py? 
Every week I will post a short tutorial that is both business and technology related, in a running series.
This article is to whet the appetite of readers who may be interested in getting a business domain name for their website, or for the individual to get a vanity domain name and website. In the follow-up post, I will show how to use a program called “whois” to look up domain names that are available for purchasing.
Once a while, I want to post something that is not directly related to business or technology, and more on the funny side.
Take the geek test! Got it on reddit.
It thinks I’m a major geek with a score of 40%. A score of 65% or above makes one a geek god, and 75% or above means a person is dysfunctionally geek!
What’s your score?
Update: Don’t let your geek bubble get popped. My take is that anyone can be a geek, not just in the narrow computer sense, but as someone who is passionate about learning a subject that they lose track of time and personal hygiene in such pursuit!
“If you’ve purchased a security suite or anti-malware tool to clean up problems on your computer, you can reasonably expect the product to do that job. If self-defending malware interferes with installation or prevents the product from running its anti-malware scan you can reasonably expect the vendor to help you with the problem. And if they just can’t get the product installed, you can reasonably expect your money back. What isn’t remotely reasonable is the idea that you should pay big bucks for the privilege of installing the program you’ve already bought.”
Norton / Symantec technical support tries to convert callers to purchase more expensive solutions, while McAfee provides quality technical support without hassle.
Online Pricing:
Norton Internet Security 2010 MSRP $69.99, and $39.99 after mail-in rebate.
McAfee Total Protection 2010 MSRP $79.99, and $49.99 after mail-in rebate.