Here is Episode 37 of our weekly PodCast, Drop that mixtape!.

The topics covered in this episode are:
- Microsoft / Razer Habu gaming mouse reviewed
- World of Warcraft Expansion becomes the fastest-selling PC game ever
- Big Day out wants to ban australian flag
- RIAA Using SWAT Teams To Bust DJs
- EA Games come clean - battlefield 2142 booster is called northern strike
- Supreme commander has been confirmed going gold

You can subscribe to the PodCast by putting this link into your iTunes / PodCast program: http://feeds.feedburner.com/AustechNews.

Download: Episode 37: Drop that mixtape! (26:55, 12.3 mb)
View: AusTech News PodCast Forum

Midomi. Try to remember that name, chances are it will come in handy when you can’t figure out which song is stuck in your head. The technology allows searching for a song by typing the song title or artist as well as by singing, humming or whistling a bit of the tune. The beta site launches Friday and offers search results that include commercially recorded tracks or versions of the song recorded by others who have used the site. The technology also lets people listen to the exact section of each of the results that matched their voice sample.

Melodis, the company behind the site, has licensed 2 million digital tracks for purchasing and currently has a user base of about 12,000. Users can create profiles and rate one other’s performances on the ad-supported site. The underlying speech- and sound-recognition technology, dubbed Multimodal Adaptive Recognition System (MARS), differs from similar technologies in that it analyzes various factors including pitch, tempo variation, speech content and location of pauses, said Chief Executive Keyvan Mohajer, who has a Ph.D. in sound- and speech-recognition from Stanford University.
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Paint.NET is image and photo manipulation software designed to be used on computers that run Windows. It supports layers, unlimited undo, special effects, and a wide variety of useful and powerful tools. It started development as an undergraduate college senior design project mentored by Microsoft, and is currently being maintained by some of the alumni that originally worked on it. Originally intended as a free replacement for the MS Paint software that comes with Windows, it has grown into a powerful yet simple tool for photo and image editing. The programming language used to create Paint.NET is C#, with a small amount of C++ for installation and shell-integration related functionality.

Paint.NET is freeware, but the team is accepting donations here.
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Microsoft has sent out an e-mail entitled “IE8 Feature Survey is Now Available!” to all Tech Beta participants. The company has emphasized that the e-mail has been sent out to many but that a smaller group will be doing the hands-on testing of the new release. The e-mail states that Microsoft is in the “planning phase” which could mean anything from being at the drawing board or at the point where the software giant is simply interested in adding on features.

Microsoft asks for “which customizations and performance scenarios need to be improved upon in IE8.” The 59-question survey hosted at Microsoft’s Connect website is curious in everyone’s favorites and RSS usage, going as far as requesting for exported versions. A screenshot of the user’s customized primary browser, not necessarily Internet Explorer, is also welcome.

View: Microsoft Connect
Source: Neowin

Feedreader is a free lightweight aggregator that supports RSS and ATOM formats. It works under Windows 98 and later versions.Feedreader’s functionality is focused on the main task - reading and organizing RSS feeds and offering seamless user experience. At the same time it offers functions that you do not find in other RSS readers.One of the main goals of Feedreader architecture is to keep its footprint small. Say goodbye to bloat: installation file is under 4MB.

Download: Feedreader v3.08
View: Changelog
View: Feedreader Home Page
Source: MSFN

Microsoft has admitted — in a roundabout way — that Vista has “high impact issues”. It has put out a call for technical testers to participate in testing of Service Pack 1, due out later this year, which will address “regressions from Windows Vista and Windows XP, security, deployment blockers and other high impact issues.”

It’s hard to know whether to be reassured that Service Pack 1 is coming, and thus that there’s now a sensible timeframe for considering deployment of Vista within businesses, OR to be alarmed that Microsoft is unleashing an OS on the world with “high impact issues” remaining in it.

In other news there’s a battle raging over the top 10 reasons to get / not to get Vista. (And a rebuttal.)

Source: APC Mag via Neowin

Thunderbird makes emailing safer, faster, and easier than ever before with the industry’s best implementations of features such as intelligent spam filters, built-in RSS reader, quick search, and much more.

Download: Mozilla Thunderbird v2.0 Beta 2 | Other Languages (Freeware)
View: Release Notes
View: Mozilla Thunderbird Home Page
Source: MSFN

Yahoo! Messenger allows you to quickly exchange messages with your online friends. Unlike e-mail, instant messages appear as soon they’re sent. By downloading the application to your computer, you can send instant messages. Other features include voice chat, file transfer, mail and stock quote alerts, sports scores, news, and much more.

Download: Yahoo! Messenger v8.1.0.239 (9.94mb)
View: Yahoo! Messenger Home Page

Alright, hands up all who are going to the midnight launch of Windows Vista. For those unaware, 44 Harvey Norman stores in Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne will be flinging open their doors at 11pm on Monday night to usher in the hordes of Microsoft devotees who can’t wait another second for the latest operating system. Various deals have been thrown in to entice punters to make the pilgrimage, including 10 percent discounts on computer hardware and a bonus Web cam for the first 100 customers.

But the main drawcard is at the Alexandria, Sydney store, where, at one minute to midnight, the first official copy of Vista Ultimate — autographed, rock star-style, by Bill Gates — will be sold by Harvey Norman Chairman Gerry Harvey and new Microsoft Australia Managing Director Tracey Fellows.

As a concept, the midnight launch is pretty neat. You get to share in the fervent anticipation of a product with like-minded souls, swapping embellished tales and forging a sort of techie simpatico as you wait in an ever-growing queue outside a shutter-bound store.

View: Full Story
Source: ZDNet Australia

Earlier this month, the people who run PirateBay.org announced plans to purchase the man-made island called Sealand. Michael Bates, Prince and heir to Sealand, said in a CBC interview that he has no intention of selling his micronation to any cause that violates international treaties. Oddly enough, Sealand was once home to nation founder Paddy Roy Bates’ pirate radio broadcasting operation.

When the interviewer asked Prince Michael about his awareness of PirateBay.org’s intentions, he spoke quite clearly on how he was against file sharing. “It’s theft of proprietary rights, it doesn’t suit us at all” he said. “In fact, I’ve written a book and Hollywood is making a movie out of it, so it would go right against the grain to go into the file sharing thing.”

The estate agent hired to handle the sale of Sealand has also gone on record to say that PirateBay.org would not be a suitable buyer. “We might not be able to sell to them, since one of the conditions imposed by the actual occupants of Sealand is that none of the activities to be carried out on Sealand should be an action against the UK, and potentially this group does not comply with this condition,” Sealand said a statement issued to InmoNaranja. “The final decision lies with the current representatives of Sealand at the time of seeing the purchaser’s proposal.”

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