Windows XP is getting pretty freakin' boring on netbooks these days. As we told you a few months back the founders of gOS have been working on a Cloud based operating system for netbooks called none other than "Cloud.". pa href="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/uIZqw7ytiThH82az80GghVBJyw4/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/uIZqw7ytiThH82az80GghVBJyw4/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/pdiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/LaptopMagazineNews?a=wpUy6IXa"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/LaptopMagazineNews?d=41" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/LaptopMagazineNews?a=wgDAf008"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/LaptopMagazineNews?d=50" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/LaptopMagazineNews?a=r7DDRJ6O"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/LaptopMagazineNews?d=198" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/LaptopMagazineNews?a=41NHjT1Z"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/LaptopMagazineNews?i=41NHjT1Z" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/LaptopMagazineNews?a=xTvhyzAT"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/LaptopMagazineNews?i=xTvhyzAT" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/LaptopMagazineNews/~4/Fyb6prCkedc" height="1" width="1"/

Une piscines, deux pingouines multiples, bon week-end tiens.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President-elect Barack Obama named two intelligence outsiders on Friday as his top spymasters to play a leading role in restoring what he has called a tarnished U.S. image abroad.div class="feedflare" a href="http://feeds.reuters.com/~f/reuters/topNews?a=8N55CTJG"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/reuters/topNews?d=41" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.reuters.com/~f/reuters/topNews?a=QubyZvo1"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/reuters/topNews?i=QubyZvo1" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.reuters.com/~f/reuters/topNews?a=ffO73D8s"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/reuters/topNews?i=ffO73D8s" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/reuters/topNews/~4/pXBv4ogeUP8" height="1" width="1"/

If the number of posts we put out per day is overwhelming your feed reader, cut out the extras and subscribe to our slimmed-down top stories feed. Skip the Mac downloads or iPhone posts or any other...

pIf the number of posts we put out per day is overwhelming your feed reader, cut out the extras and subscribe to our slimmed-down a href="http://lifehacker.com/tag/top/index.xml"top stories feed/a. Skip the Mac downloads or iPhone posts or any other topic you don't care about by a href="http://lifehacker.com/344188/get-only-the-posts-you-want-from-lifehackers-site-feeds"customizing our feed URLs/a. This week's most popular posts include: ullia href="http://lifehacker.com/5124643"Enigma Desktop Customization Update Now Available/abr /em"Windows only: Reader Kaelri—famous for the beautiful and functional Enigma desktop—has packaged and released version 1.1 of the customization files."/em/lilia href="http://lifehacker.com/5124330"Exhaustive List of Free Microsoft Downloads/abr /em"Tech evangelist and Microsoft consultant Blake Handler hosts an impressively completist list of free Windows programs offered by Microsoft, dug from the trenches of Del.icio.us tags."/em/lilia href="http://lifehacker.com/5123804"Coke Can Clean Your Toilet in a Pinch/abr /em"When your toilet's got rings and lime scale stains and you've got no cleaning gear on hand, grab a can of Coke out of the fridge. "/em/lilia href="http://lifehacker.com/5124955"Windows 7 Beta Boasts Sub-30 Second Boot Time/abr /em"The Windows 7 beta offers a speedier startup than its predecessor: for me the beta boots to a fully functional desktop in under 30 seconds, faster than the preview or Vista."/em/lilia href="http://lifehacker.com/5124261"Why Your Self-Handicapping Excuses Don't Work (And How to Fix Them)/abr /em"The New York Times takes a revealing look at self-handicapping excuses—like 'I barely slept the night before the test'—and why we create them, as well as the extremely unlikely chance that anyone else buys them."/em/lilia href="http://lifehacker.com/5122848"Hard Lessons in the Importance of Backups: JournalSpace Wiped Out/abr /em"Blogging service JournalSpace has been completely wiped out after the drives that housed their entire database were overwritten. The problem was that their backups weren't actually backups at all."/em/lilia href="http://lifehacker.com/5122782"Build a Hackintosh for under $240/abr /em"Industrious tinkers at eclectic technology blog UselessNinjas have put together a guide to building a sub-$240 computer to run Mac OS X. "/em/lilia href="http://lifehacker.com/5123088"MyOpenBar Finds You Free Drinks/abr /em"MyOpenBar is a web site that catalogs where you can drink for free in major cities across the United States."/em/lilia href="http://lifehacker.com/5124856"Most Popular Reliable and Affordable Web Hosts/abr /em"Reader Stephanie wanted to know what Lifehacker readers thought were the most reliable and affordable web hosts out there. Here are the top vote-getters."/em/lilia href="http://lifehacker.com/5123683"Download and Print the 2009 Compact Calendar/abr /em"You're back at work after the holidays and planning out your big projects of the year—time to print out Dave Seah's excellent compact calendar for 2009."/em/li/ul/p br clear="both" style="clear: both;"/ br clear="both" style="clear: both;"/ a href="http://www.pheedo.com/click.phdo?s=4844913842ded30be836f81ffeab26c3p=1"img alt="" style="border: 0;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?s=4844913842ded30be836f81ffeab26c3p=1"//a img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=4844913842ded30be836f81ffeab26c3" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/div class="feedflare" a href="http://feeds.gawker.com/~f/lifehacker/full?a=SAObAIGt"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/lifehacker/full?d=120" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.gawker.com/~f/lifehacker/full?a=eIpTn60y"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/lifehacker/full?d=41" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.gawker.com/~f/lifehacker/full?a=ieQWEpVM"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/lifehacker/full?i=ieQWEpVM" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.gawker.com/~f/lifehacker/full?a=JnIlDtkG"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/lifehacker/full?i=JnIlDtkG" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/lifehacker/full/~4/XQH9nN6pjYw" height="1" width="1"/

div class="image"a href="http://pixhost.ws/avaxhome/big_show.php?/avaxhome/06/7b/000a7b06.jpeg" target="_blank"img src="http://pixhost.ws/avaxhome/06/7b/000a7b06_medium.jpeg" id="external_img_686854"//a/divbr/ div class="center"bKhalid Aziz, George Y. Wu, "Cancer Screening"/bbr/ Humana Press | 2002-01-15 | ISBN: 0896038653 | 324 pages | PDF | 2,1 MB/divbr/ Newington VA Medical Center, CT. Provides a review of cancer screening for primary care physicians, internists, and residents. Reviews all aspects including cost effectiveness, biology, epidemiology, and sensitivity. Details present and future uses of molecular genetics and new radiological methods.

Your time in the nuclear wasteland will increase thanks to plans that Bethesda Softworks has to raise the level cap in Fallout 3, its acclaimed post-apocalyptic role-playing game. Lead producer Jeff Gardiner told Eurogamer in an interview that the company will boost the level cap from 20 to 30 in the upcoming Broken Steel downloadable content pack, which is due out in March.

Broken Steel is the third DLC pack for the game. The first, Operation: Anchorage, is due out this month, and it will let players experience the liberation of Alaska from Chinese forces. The second DLC pack, the Pitt, is due out in February and will let players explore the remains of Pittsburgh. Due to an exclusivity deal, the DLC will only be offered for the Xbox 360 and Windows versions of the game. Operation: Anchorage will cost 800 Microsoft Points on the Xbox Live Marketplace.

In addition, Broken Steel will also remove the game's ending, meaning that once you finish the storyline you will be able to continue to adventure around the wasteland. Currently, once you finish the game the credits roll and that's it. By removing the ending, Bethesda will let you work your way toward building a level 30 character.

http://uk.pc.ign.com/articles/943/943469p1.html

div class="image"a href="http://pixhost.ws/avaxhome/big_show.php?/avaxhome/04/7b/000a7b04.jpeg" target="_blank"img src="http://pixhost.ws/avaxhome/04/7b/000a7b04_medium.jpeg" id="external_img_686852"//a/divbr/ div class="center"bDavid G. Nathan, "The Cancer Treatment Revolution"/bbr/ Wiley | 2007-03-30 | ISBN: 0471946540 | 272 pages | PDF | 1,8 MB/divbr/ "A wonderful journey through modern medical science, told with warmth and insight, brought to life through the stories of people confronting cancer. This book will inspire and educate both laymen and caregivers."br/ —Jerome Groopman, M.D., author of The Measure of Our Days and The Anatomy of Hope and Recanati, Professor, Harvard Medical School

This brand new v1.11 demo showcases both the basic Shock Force game as well as the Marines Module, sold separately from the basic game. The Combat Mission: Shock Force Demo will require approximately 1 Gigabyte of free space on your hard drive in order to install.

DEMO LIMITATIONS:



Includes three scenarios which can be played as either US or Syrian

Includes a fourth scenario, "Demo Training" which was designed to only be played from the US perspective

All multiplayer modes are active (TCP-IP, PBEM, Hotseat)

You can access the full Game Editor, but the save function is disabled.

The original full game manual is included as a pdf file

The demo scenarios are only in English. See Game Language Info below for more details on how to play these battles in other languages.


DEMO SCENARIO INFO:


Demo Training, a small training scenario designed to familiarize new players to Combat Mission before engaging in "real" combat. (Blue play only)

Smashing Steel: A Syrian mechanized force heads south as an American Stryker and tank force heads north. (Battle begins before dawn in the dark, but as time progresses and the sun rises, visibility and lighting will increase)

Going to Town: Stryker infantry mix it up with the Syrian forces as they enter a small town.

USMC Going to Town: Marines combined arms force fights it out with a Syrian force in a small town. The battlefield is the same as the Stryker based Going to Town scenario in order to highlight the differences between the units in each.


Find out more about the demo as well as a list or mirrors at the official site.

http://uk.pc.ign.com/articles/943/943406p1.html

Being torn over which character design to pick for the Dark Templar class in the multiplayer portion of StarCraft 2, Blizzard Entertainment is allowing fans to decide. Over the next month, fans can choose between the Lenessa or Zer'atai designs. Blizzard is even allowing fans to choose a third option, which spawns a mixture of both. Official descriptions and pics are posted below:

"The first option represents the Lenassa tribe of dark templar, which made its debut in the original StarCraft. This unit carries a single warp blade, and a cloth shroud covers its face."

"The second option represents the Zer'atai tribe of dark templar, who wield dual scythes and wear an ensemble of heavy armor and the bones of slain zerg."

http://uk.pc.ign.com/articles/943/943208p1.html

div class="image"a href="http://pixhost.ws/avaxhome/big_show.php?/avaxhome/0a/7b/000a7b0a.jpeg" target="_blank"img src="http://pixhost.ws/avaxhome/0a/7b/000a7b0a_medium.jpeg" id="external_img_686858"//a/divbr/ div class="center"bDave Visel, "Living With Cancer"/bbr/ Rutgers University Press | 2006-06-15 | ISBN: 081353819X | 375 pages | PDF | 1 MB/divbr/ You've got cancer. Now what? It is one among the myriad of daunting questions that the more than 1.3 million Americans who are diagnosed with invasive cancer each year find themselves asking. There is, of course, no simple answer. Cancer does not come with a set of instructions and most people have no real idea of what lies ahead. There are, however, certain things that all individuals affected by the disease can do to help navigate their way though this life-altering ordeal.

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A new patch for GSC Game World's S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Clear Sky is out. Patch 1.5.08 improves both the download and retail version of the first-person shooter. Patch notes, taken from the game's official web site, are posted below:

1.5.04 - 1.5.07 saved games will be compatible with patch 1.5.08.

Changes:
- Added the possibility for admins to take screenshots of a player's screen (as an anti-wallhack-cheats measure) by console commands (make_screenshot, screenshot_all).
- Fixed bug with banning the players.
- Fixed bug with saving the rank and money amount of the player upon the round restart (if the player deliberately closed the game process in the task manager, and then reconnected).
- Increased the stability of the network play.

http://uk.pc.ign.com/articles/943/943253p1.html

h4'Feature complete' code demand buckles servers/h4 pMicrosoft has postponed broad availability of the first Windows 7 beta in order to keep up with anticipated download demand..../p

Frogster America today announced that in less than a month, the population of its highly anticipated free-to-play MMORPG Runes of Magic, has already surpassed 300,000 players. The steady population growth will enable Frogster to continuously update and polish the game during the run up to its formal launch in March 2009.

"Frogster would like to thank our dedicated community for their constructive feedback since the beginning of the open beta," said Daniel Ullrich, Director of Product Management at Frogster Interactive. "With the development of the launch content almost complete, it's now up to the community to do their part in giving us feedback to make the game great. Runes of Magic is their game and we want to make sure the new content and features we are creating continually add to the excitement and fun in the world."

During the festive break, Runes of Magic convinced critics and won several prestigious awards from the games media. After declaring Runes of Magic as the best free-to-play game of Show at the Games Convention 2008 in August, TenTonHammer.com named Runes of Magic "Surprise Hit 2008". The editors of Mmorpg-planet.com selected Runes of Magic as the "Best Free MMORPG of 2008" and it was the only free-to-play title to be nominated for MMORPG.com's upcoming "Most anticipated Game of 2009" Readers Choice award.

Runes of Magic began its open beta in December with an English and German version. All interested players can now set up an account and download the client for free at www.runesofmagic.com.

Runes of Magic – a world full of wizardry and adventure

With an extensive range of features Runes of Magic prepares to redefine the standard of free-to-play MMO games. Right from the launch Runes of Magic will convey its absorbing story through more than 1.000 quests embedded in an atmospheric world. Players can choose between six main classes. Combined with a secondary class they dispose of 36 individual combinations of character classes over all. All characters possess unique skills with impressive combo attacks and can use mounts. A particularly attractive feature for guilds and players is the possibility to arrange their own virtual homes with individual furnishing. Thanks to an extensive crafting and reputation system, thrilling PVP as well as demanding dungeons and boss-monsters, no wishes remain unsatisfied. The Taiwanese developer Runewaker has developed Runes of Magic according to western MMO standards within a time frame of three years. The studio will provide new challenges for players every three to four months with free add-ons and updates. MMO fans can find more information, pictures and videos on the official website www.runesofmagic.com.

Runes of Magic features



Free-to-play: no monthly fees, free download

Extensive dual class system (six primary and secondary classes)

Versatile spell and attack combinations

Engaging background story

More than 1,000 quests and quest series at launch

No zone boundaries thanks to a seamless architecture

A mix of instanced, tile based, and persistent dungeons to explore

Individually developable skills and spells

Armor sets with special bonuses

Dynamic item system with hundreds of upgradeable runes

Optional PvP system with arena battles and guild wars

Ranking system with player-ranking lists

Unique mounts including horses, tigers, striders and more

Epic crafting system with the ability to improve existing items

Personalization of player houses through individual furnishing

Reputation system

Customizable user interface with the ability to use Add-Ons

Map and radar system to easily find item dealers, resources and quests

In-game auction houses for trading items

Teleport-Runes for instant travel

Mouse and keyboard controls for movement

Regular updates with new content

Cross-server fights through three-server-battles (in development)

Guild houses in special zones (in development)


About Runewaker Entertainment Ltd.
Runewaker Entertainment was founded in August of 2004, with the headquarters located in Taichung, Taiwan. The founding members are all very experienced in the field and decided to come together to pursue their own dream. Currently Runewaker employs over 40 highly skilled programmers, designers and artists and is constantly expanding. Runewaker specializes in making massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPG). The company has built their own engine from scratch that rivals some of the best that is available out on the market. Their first product, Radiant Arcana (Runes of Magic), is already completed and currently in Open Beta Phase in China. Runewaker is currently producing more content for Runes of Magic. Webpage: http://www.runewaker.com/

div class="image"a href="http://pixhost.ws/avaxhome/big_show.php?/avaxhome/08/7b/000a7b08.jpeg" target="_blank"img src="http://pixhost.ws/avaxhome/08/7b/000a7b08_medium.jpeg" id="external_img_686856"//a/divbr/ div class="center"bCritical Companion to Dante: A Literary Reference to His Life and Work/bbr/ Facts on File | 2008 | ISBN: 0816065217 | Pages: 566 | PDF | 6.76 MB/div

pimg src="http://cache.gawker.com/assets/images/gizmodo/2009/01/pirates.600.2.jpg" width="804" height="379" align="left" hspace="4" vspace="2"/The Saudi oil tanker that has been held by Somali pirates since November was apparently freed up after a bundle of $3 million was airdropped by parachute to the ship. An expert drop. [a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/10/world/africa/10somalia.html?ref=world"NYT/a]/p br clear="both" style="clear: both;"/ br clear="both" style="clear: both;"/ a href="http://www.pheedo.com/click.phdo?s=62aec797523f92a6d950be060403e7afp=1"img alt="" style="border: 0;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?s=62aec797523f92a6d950be060403e7afp=1"//a img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=62aec797523f92a6d950be060403e7af" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/div class="feedflare" a href="http://feeds.gawker.com/~f/gizmodo/full?a=AvtXz5Wf"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/gizmodo/full?d=120" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.gawker.com/~f/gizmodo/full?a=ynD72Hmc"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/gizmodo/full?d=41" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.gawker.com/~f/gizmodo/full?a=Ox3geUjt"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/gizmodo/full?i=Ox3geUjt" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.gawker.com/~f/gizmodo/full?a=8ySDvqXO"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/gizmodo/full?i=8ySDvqXO" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~4/wPVSn7HBufs" height="1" width="1"/

The Saudi oil tanker that has been held by Somali pirates since November was apparently freed up after a bundle of $3 million was airdropped by parachute to the ship. An expert drop. [NYT]

BioWare has announced that it will showcase Mass Effect 2, the sequel to its critically-acclaimed RPG, at this year's upcoming Game Developers Conference. The developer revealed on the gaming event's web site that it would discuss what it learned from the first game's level design and how the second game would improve upon the formula.

GDC will once again take place at San Francisco's Moscone Center. This year's event will be held from March 23 - 27. BioWare Project Manager Corey Andruko and BioWare Lead Technical Designer Dusty Everman will lead the 60-minute lecture. The session's official description is posted below:

"Session Description
This session examines the BioWare Mass Effect team's new level-creation process, which is focused on maximizing iteration for quality while minimizing rework and cost. This approach to building levels strives to integrate the Design, Art, and Production teams such that the highest-risk level-creation issues are addressed early in the development cycle. Lessons learned from Mass Effect lead to a detailed description of the new level-creation process, and graphical examples of a level illustrate its progression through the necessary phases. The discussion also examines how BioWare is currently implementing this process using elements of Scrum and Lean Development.

Takeaway
Attendees will: - Gain insight into some of the major issues the development team encountered while building Mass Effect at BioWare; - Get a detailed look at the Mass Effect team's new approach to creating levels while avoiding these issues; - Find out how this new process is working for the Mass Effect team; - Learn about new pitfalls the team discovered that can potentially be avoided on future game projects.

Intended Audience and Prerequisites
This lecture is intended for producers, designers, or any game developer involved in planning, specification, or content creation for game levels. An understanding of modern video game development workflows is recommended."

http://uk.pc.ign.com/articles/942/942902p1.html

THQ Inc. today announced plans to release a multiplayer beta for Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II, the award winning Real-time strategy game from Relic Entertainment.

The beta will be hosted via Steam and offered exclusively to Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War - Soulstorm owners on January 21, followed by a worldwide public release on January 28. The beta will feature all four playable races, five multiplayer maps, and Microsoft's Games for Windows - LIVE TrueSkill Matchmaking.

Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II, developed by THQ's internal studio, Relic Entertainment, is a Real-time strategy game set in the grim, war-ravaged world of Games Workshop's Warhammer 40,000 science fiction universe. Featuring vicious front-line combat, destructible environments, a fully cooperative multiplayer mode, four unique playable races, and a non-linear single player campaign with branching storylines, Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II delivers the ultimate sci-fi fantasy RTS experience. The game is scheduled for release on February 23, 2009 for Windows PC, and will be available through worldwide retail and online outlets. For more information on Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II, please visit www.dawnofwar2.com.

via MacNN:

Apple's online store is currently offering seven refurbished Mac models for $1,599 or less. Starting at $949 is the white 2.4GHz MacBook with 2GB of memory and a 160GB hard drive. Four iMacs are featured, the first is the 20-inch, 2.4GHz model with 1GB of memory and a 250GB hard drive for $999. The second 20-inch model has a 2.66GHz processor, 2GB of memory and a 320GB hard drive for $1,299. T...



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via MacNN:

DealNN deals for today include a range of items from notebook cases and routers to MacBooks. First up is the APC notebook carrying case priced at $14.99 at MacMall.com. For today only J&R.com is offering the refurbished Linksys wireless G broadband router for $29.99. The Lenovo 19-inch widescreen LCD monitor is available at mWave.com for $129.88. Apple's online store is offering refurbished wh...



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