Siri doesn't do translations, it's more of an advanced voice recognition tool. Am I wrong? This would mean that at the moment, Apple's Siri and Google Translation would have two different strengths; Siri: usable natural language voice recognition (at least that's how they sell it) and Google Tranlation, well, multi-language translations.

This is a very good review, Ahmed. Thanks for sharing!

Two truly open initiatives offering back the crowdsourced data to everyone (it doesn't seem to be the case with OpenSignalMaps): OpenCellID.org and openBmap.org.

Am I the first one to point to the full list of price changes?

And also interesting (at least for some) is Apple will allow business to sell custom apps to other businesses in volume directly.

I tend to believe it is easier for Apple to change their license and allow GPL software in the app store than having VLC move away from the GPL.

Despite the licenses compatibility challenges, you can tell Apple you want the 'VLC Media Player' app back in the app store. Color me utopic, but that's trying to be part of the solution.

I invite friends, and my friends know my name. I don't see the problem at all.

Actually, when I tried Game Center some time ago, the fact that I did not know who was "Weird Username Here" who accepted my invitation was kind of awkward. As much as usernames are cool, I also want to know which username is associated to which friend.

This change sounds like a improvement to me.

Okay, that's a bit off-topic, but not that much when we discuss virtual globes and the likes. Here's a dismissed submission last week that I think worthy of sharing: "It's a dream come true. After MapQuest and Yahoo actively supporting the Wikipedia-like map initiative OpenStreetMap.org. Microsoft announced that they hired OpenStreetMap's founder Steve Coast for their Bing Maps team. But there's more, they committed providing orthorectified aerial imagery and more to the project. From the official announcement: "Continuously innovating and improving our map data is a top priority and a massive undertaking at Bing. That's why we're excited to announce a new initiative to work with the OpenStreetMap project, a community of more than 320,000 people who have built high quality maps for every country on earth. Microsoft is providing access to our Bing Aerial Imagery for use in the OpenStreetMap project, and we have hired industry veteran Steve Coast to lead this effort. [...] As a first step in this engagement, we plan to enable access to Bing's global orthorectified aerial imagery, as a backdrop of OSM editors. Also, Microsoft is working on new tools to better enable contributions to OSM." Microsoft already added the OpenStreetMap layer to Bing Maps last August."

Clearly, this means to me that open data has won that round and that Tele Atlas and NAVTEQ are in deeper trouble today than a few months ago.

Now to go back to Google, at the moment, but it could change anytime, they're going on a different road away from OpenStreetMap with their Google Map Maker.

I used to suffer from a very acute case of RSI, requiring wearing a wrist brace and seeing a physiotherapist twice a week for more than a year. As a programmer, I seriously considered finding a new career but thankfully, I have recovered. Of course, recovery is relative here and as you know, you never come back to your college days when you could abuse your writs with all nighters after all nighters, you are always as risk. In my case, I can type without wrist braces for 10 hours a day, 6 days a week, and feel no pain. I do that on a full size keyboard at a desk; I can type with a laptop on my lap but only for a few hours before I am reminded that this is wrong.

One thing that really helped me was to get rid of the mouse. My main setup is a Unicomp EnduraPro keyboard with a touch-stick. A touch-stick is not as fast and as accurate as a mouse but the touch-stick is right there on the home row and it's easy to use with either hand to you don't put all the strain on the same hand all the time. I tried the Lenovo UltraNav keyboard but I don't like its cramped layout and I fell that the keys are not tactile enough. My laptop is a Lenovo X-Series with a touch-stick only. The key to be able to work efficiently with the touch-stick is to take the time to fine tune the sensitivity and to make sure that you can scroll with it in all your application. See the ThinkWiki website to learn how to do that under GNU/Linux.

But I have to be honest, finding a new keyboard is not what allowed me to move away from the wrist brace. It was only a minor part in a greater program to get my wrists back into shape. Your first goal should be to strengthen your wrists. Your physiotherapist probably recommended you some exercises and you have to do then. After a long and painful recovery doing wrist curls with barbels, I started doing rock climbing and this is probably the most effective way that I have to stay away from the wrist brace. If you go that route, be careful because the potential for injuries is very real if you try to do all the fun moves. Dynos and crimpers are not for you until you move away from the wrist braces but rock climbing will still be much more entertaining than wrist curls so you're more likely to keep a regular training schedule all year long, even when you don't feel the pain.

If your are not seeing a health professional, get off Slashdot and book an appointment with one immediately. Slashdot will recommend gadgets is this is not what you need. Good luck with your quest. I trust that you too can enjoy computing once again.