I spend a lot of time doing work at the coffee shop across the street from my apartment.

Why?

Three reasons:

* The coffee is PRETTY GOOD

* The refills are FREE

* Even though the WiFi is NOT FREE…

* …I CAN ACCESS MY OWN WIFI HOTSPOT FROM MY APARTMENT ACROSS THE STREET, so I can surf the Internet all day long without paying for it.

But starting on July 1, thanks to Starbucks…

…there will soon be more than 11,000 new places around the US where I can go to surf the web for free.

Yes, starting on July 1 Starbucks will offer free unlimited Internet access at all its US stores.

So, is this a big deal?

You bet it is…and here’s why:

Click to read more!

By now you have probably heard about the LA woman…

…who is SUING GOOGLE AFTER BEING HIT BY A CAR.

Here’s the story:

* This woman from LA used her Blackberry to ask Google for walking directions while in Park City, Utah

* The walking directions told her to walk along a busy highway that had no sidewalks

* She did what Google told her

* She was struck by a car

* Now she’s suing Google because the GPS directions told her to do something that was unsafe.

Pretty stupid, right?

But GPS leads people to do all kinds of STUPID things…

…so just to make sure we all stay safe, let’s review some common-sense GPS rules:

Click to read more!

Is your anti-virus software up-to-date???

I sure hope so…

…because the bad guys and hackers have a new trick up their sleeves!

Here’s what you need to know:

PDF THREAT #1:

MORE PDFS ARE INFECTED WITH MALICIOUS CODE

Until recently, most of us thought of pdf documents as being highly safe and secure.

But now that’s changed:

Because now hackers have figured out

Click to read more!

Last week, Facebook was in the doghouse over privacy.

This week, it’s Google.

What happened?

As most people know, Google has special cars that are equipped with special cameras mounted on the roof…

…and these cars go all over the world collecting “Street View” photos of just about every house and business on the planet.

Is that creepy enough?

Okay, it gets worse.

Last week, it was reported that Google “inadvertently” discovered that as these “Street View” cars drove up and down every street in the world…

…“by mistake” the cars were automatically recording what websites some people were visiting and may have even recorded their email and some passwords.

Oops.

That’s bad.

And here’s what you need to know:

Click to read more!

Here’s my brilliant observation for this week about social networks like Facebook and Twitter, the Internet, and privacy:

If you’re smart…

…you will think of the Internet and social networks as something you should DATE, not something you MARRY.

When you’re dating:

You’re GENERALLY on your best behavior

You share SOME of yourself, NOT all of yourself.

When you’re married:

Let’s just say that over time, it

Click to read more!

It looks like 22-year-old David Kernell is going to jail.

His crime?

Hacking into Sarah Palin’s Yahoo! email account during the 2008 presidential election.

David Kernell’s lawyers say what he did was basically a college prank.

Clearly, the jury disagreed.

David Kernell faces up to 21 years of jail time for his crime.

And here’s what the rest of us can learn from this story:

Click to read more!

You’ve heard of Facebook.

You’ve heard of Twitter.

And now, you’re going to hear about Blippy.

Blippy is a social networking site (of course!) where:

You give them all your credit card numbers
.
Then every time you buy something…
.
…Blippy automatically announces your purchase to all your Facebook friends and all your Twitter followers.

Just as an FYI:

Blippy had a little privacy problem over

Click to read more!

Here’s what the headlines say:

* PASSWORDS, SECURITY PROTOCOLS COST MORE THAN THEY SAVE, SAYS MICROSOFT RESEARCHER

ZDNet (blog)

* MICROSOFT: CHANGING PASSWORDS ISN’T WORTH THE EFFORT

PC Magazine

So based on these headlines…

…should we all just stop worrying about passwords?

Absolutely not!

In fact, the research being cited in these headlines is IMPORTANT, but MISUNDERSTOOD…

…so here’s what you need to know:

Click to read more!

So far, April has been quite a month for the world of tech:

* Saturday, April 3: Apple releases iPad

* Thursday, April 8: Apple unveils iPhone 4.0

* Sunday, April 11: Palm is said to be up for sale to the highest bidder…

…and presumably, this is in response to the continued successful of iPhone and lack of success for the Palm Pre and Pixi.

* Monday, April 12: Best Buy announces it will sell the Barnes & Noble e-reader, called “The Nook”…

…and presumably, this is in response to the successful release of iPad, which is also an e-reader.

* Monday, April 12: Google unveils dramatic new changes to its online office suite called Google Docs…

…and presumably, this is in response to the successful release of iPad, which offers its own office suite.

* Monday, April 12: Microsoft unveils a new line of mobile phones called “Kin”…

…and presumably, this is in response to the continued successful of iPhone.

But there’s been one more piece of news about Apple this month that is perhaps the most OVERLOOKED, and also the most DRAMATIC:

Click to read more!

Believe it or not, there is still is something to say about the Apple iPad, and this is it:

* If you are happily married, DON’T BUY one of these devices

* If you want your kids to do well in school, DON’T BUY one of these devices

* If you enjoy living in the real world vs. living in a virtual world, DON’T BUY one of these devices

There I said it.

And I think it’s important to say, because this thing is as addictive as crack cocaine…

…and here’s why:

Click to read more!