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Although Joost was among first companies to offer broadcast-style video capabilities through the web, the service always suffered from a couple of major limitations: lack of unique, noteworthy content and the fact that users had to download a separate Joost player to watch videos, which is more than what a lot of people is willing to do.

The company had inadvertently worked itself into a strategic hole, whereas rival video sites such as YouTube.com and Hulu.com were thriving in terms of viewership. Now, taking a different approach, Joost has re-launched as a Flash-based video streaming service available to anyone with a web browser.

The revamped site now includes more than 46,000 professionally produced videos, including content from partners such as CBS, Sony Pictures, Viacom, Warner Bros and others. Looking to distinguish itself from Hulu.com, Joost is unsurprisingly focusing its efforts on enhancing the site's social networking features, hoping that users will be more engaged than at other video portals.

But while Joost’s revamp is perhaps a step in the right direction, it really doesn’t bring anything new to the table and the majority of its material can be found elsewhere on the web. I wonder if it’s too late for the once most promising Internet TV service or if Joost will manage to carve a niche for itself.

It was just last week that we heard about Asustek's plan to introduce touch screen Eee PCs in the near future. Apparently their manufacturing facilities are really on the ball, as the company has now launched the first such touch screen Eee model. It is an Eee PC desktop, intended to compete with the HP TouchSmart, coming in at a lower price point.

The desktop is somewhat weak on hardware, but not any weaker than you'd expect from an embedded PC system, with a 1.6GHz Atom, a gig of RAM and a 160GB HDD. The size of the HDD was likely chosen due to the limitations that Microsoft has in place for Windows XP on embedded systems. The initial version of the touch screen Eee will run Windows only – though Linux versions may be available soon.

The systems aren't immediately available, with the first batch coming out in late November, though there's no mention about whether or not Asustek had this planned.

Ubisoft today announced that the long awaited sequel to Far Cry has finally gone gold. This of course means that the development stage is completed, and the game is now ready for duplication in preparation for its launch on October 21.

Far Cry 2 runs on an all-new game engine and, like the original Far Cry, features non-scripted enemy AI and completely destructible environments. The game takes place in a war-torn, African state 50 square kilometers in size, where players will find themselves forced to make deals with corrupt warlords on both sides of the conflict in order to survive. Far Cry 2 will debut exclusively on Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 at $59.99 and also on the PC priced at a lower $49.99.

It looks like the rumors turned out to be true, at least for the most part. Apple today announced new MacBook and MacBook Pro notebooks that are thinner and lighter yet more robust than before thanks to a new manufacturing process for the casing, carved from a solid brick of aluminum.

There’s two new MacBooks are available – a 15.4-inch model for $1,599 and a 13.3-inch model for $1,299 – that's on top of the white plastic model which now starts at $999 and a couple of 15.4-inch MacBook Pro models with the base spec starting at $1,999. On the hardware front, Jobs has heavily pushed the Macs' graphics performance with a new integrated part, dubbed the GeForce 9400M, that can be paired with a higher-end 9600M GT in the premium MacBook Pro models.

Other notable features include LED backlit displays, a new multi-touch glass touchpad that will also act as button and is 39% larger than the one on outgoing models, backlit keyboards, a magnetic latch, and improved battery life. Likewise, Apple has updated its MacBook Air notebook, keeping it as skinny as ever but with improved graphics, a faster processor and more storage space.

Nvidia’s GPU problems had so far been confined to laptops only, but now HP says the faulty graphic chips are also to blame for similar problems in its desktops. Specifically, the company has confirmed that 38 different models in its Pavillion Slimline range of desktop machines are prone to suffer from loss of video output or booting problems.

HP is extending the warranties on these problems for an extra year or until December 31st, 2009 and will replace the motherboards for free under the plan. The increasingly widening scope of Nvidia graphics failures is bad news for the graphics vendor, which is already being sued by its shareholders for allegedly covering up the problems with the faulty GPUs.

In what is becoming a trend for Microsoft this year, they are once again going on the offensive against the Wii with a price drop on the Xbox 360. While this new move isn't strictly a price drop, that's certainly what it ends up being for the customer, with the introduction of a temporary item promo with Arcade users getting the option of receiving a 512MB memory card for free or a 20GB HDD for $20.

Unlike most promos, this one applies to existing customers as well – if someone purchased a Core or Arcade unit, they apparently qualify. For those that go in and buy an Arcade version, they now have the option of upgrading to a more respectable console with the inclusion of the HDD. The stock 256MB of space on the Arcade was one of the drawbacks to its $200 price tag, and this new promo clearly adds significant value to the cheap console.

The 360 price cut turned out to be a huge boon to Microsoft in terms of sales. This new offering just makes it an even better buy and comes in preparation of the New Xbox Experience, which will roll out November 19 and require 128MB of free storage space.

Have you noticed less spam in your inbox this morning? Probably not, but it just may be that the FTC has dealt a blow to the spam industry that will result in a considerable drop in how much junk email traverses the Internet. A recent announcement has confirmed that the FTC uncovered and has shut down one of the largest spam rings in the world. This one in particular churned out emails we're all too familiar with, trying to peddle prescription drugs.

How they managed to find the people behind the spam ring isn't mentioned, though they plan to reveal more information later. There's also no specifics about just how much spam this particular operation was responsible for, which is important given that upwards of 95% of email is spam. Unfortunately, so long as people continued to be suckered in by spam, it's unlikely to go away. For every spam operation taken down, it seems another five pop up.

Warner Bros. Entertainment today announced a deal that would enable online retailers to digitally distribute movies from the studio in the DivX standard format starting this month and high definition format in September 2009.

This means you'll be able to watch all the current and back-catalog Warner Bros. titles on hundreds of DivX certified devices, which include LG and Samsung phones, PlayStation 3 consoles and many Blu-ray and DVD players. The move is certainly good news for the DivX camp and marks the second deal with a major studio, following a similar one with Sony Pictures earlier this year.

Asus has been slapping the Eee badge on everything it possibly can – from netbooks to nettops to monitors and LCD TVs – hoping to bank on the wild success of the original low-cost Eee PC. A recent mishap in Japan is not doing much to help the diluting brand, however, with the company issuing a recall of all Eee Box PCs sold in the country due to a virus found on them.

Named “recycled.exe,” the virus is located on the D drive partition of the machine and once the user first starts up the system, it copies itself to the master boot drive and any attached drives. According to reports, the virus slows down the system and could attempt to download more dangerous malware from the Internet.

Apparently, the virus originated from a flash drive used for testing and inspection of the systems. The company said it has only sold 300 of 4,500 Eee Box PCs in Japan, and has confirmed that only Eee Box PCs sold into the Japanese market are affected.

Bush signs controversial anti-piracy law @ Reuters
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Windows XP has to be the most tweakable and skinnable piece of software ever created. Of course, how to compete with such a dominant and widely used operating system, but then again it might also be its light blue fisher price-like theme that gets in everybody’s nerves eventually.

For some of us, upgrading to Vista has been somewhat of a relief. The rest of Windows users still using XP have probably either gone back to the silver boxy Windows or relied on official or third party patching for getting the job done. Unfortunately last time I checked (a couple of years ago), even the most elaborate skins for popular applications like WindowBlinds lack the finish and subtlety I require.

But don’t despair. My advice, use some of the Microsoft-made themes that replace the original blue theme and make for a much better impression than the other built-in silver or green themes.

Read the complete post on the TechSpot Blog.

As the Professional Developers Conference approaches, Microsoft plans not only to discuss their currently code-named Windows 7 product but also to distribute a pre-beta version among attendees. Many have been wondering what the official name will be once the next release of Windows hits the streets.

In a quick announcement today on the company’s Windows Vista Team Blog, Mike Nash, the corporate vice president of Windows product management revealed what some already suspected: Windows 7 will be officially called… Windows 7. He went on to explain that the company opted to keep the '7' name for simplicity – as this is the seventh release of Windows – and because Microsoft doesn't want to come up with a new “aspirational” name that simply wouldn’t do justice to their goal of staying firmly rooted in the ideas of Vista while evolving and refining the operating system.

Personally, I like the fact that they are keeping it simple and I’m looking forward to learn more about Windows 7 in the coming weeks. So there you have it, what do you think of the ‘new’ name?

Asustek's success with the Eee has led them to expand the line in numerous fashions, from creating desktop PC versions to making higher-power ultra slim versions available.

Now, Asustek is planning to expand the Eee line even further, with the introduction of Asustek Eee motherboards. No system specifications are available yet, but it's easy to imagine that the boards would be similar in spec to existing Eee hardware. It'll be interesting to see where they intend to compete with this board. They will most likely go up against the Atom and Pico-ITX platform.

Future Eee projects include potential touch screen units and more. What was just a short while ago nothing more than a cheap laptop has turned into an entire portfolio of hardware.

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The dream of free nationwide wireless came a bit closer to reality today, after the FCC released a report which states that providing wireless over the 2155-2180MHz spectrum would not interfere with service from other wireless carriers. This clears the way for the FCC to move forward with a plan to auction off airwaves to a bidder who agrees to offer free (albeit ad-supported) national wireless Internet service.

The decision is a blow to the telecoms, specifically T-Mobile, which is keen to protect revenue from its own wireless networks and had raised concerns that the service would disrupt the company’s 3G wireless network. The next step is to create rules for the new network, and then auction off the spectrum sometime in the first half of next year.

It could be a while before proposed network actually materializes, however. The free nationwide wireless service would have to reach 50 percent of the U.S. population in four years and 95 percent within a decade. It remains to be seen if anyone will be tempted to bid for the spectrum and then pony up millions of dollars in infrastructure.