I recently wrote about the Election Countdown gadgets I made for Windows users, so today I wanted to share the dashboard widget that Mac OS X users can use. Just as it’s Windows counterparts, this widget will count down the days until the 2008 Presidential Election.
Download: Election Countdown 2008
MyColors 2008 was released today, and includes a free theme. MyColors makes it easy for users to customize their desktop without having to worry about which software is needed and so forth. You can purchase and download themes and apply them using the MyColor theme manager. Stardock has teamed up with the NHL, the NCAA, NBA, GM, Ford, and many others to create themes for everything ranging from the Corvette Desktop to the Boston Celtics. In addition, dozens of totally original themes have been created as well and more hundreds more are on the way.
To celebrate the official launch of MyColors 2008, Stardock is providing a free theme on the MyColors website so that users can try MyColors for themselves. It is compatible with WindowBlinds and Object Desktop.
Download: MyColors 2008
The latest iPhone and iPod Touch updates brought us a new feature called WebClips. Basically, you can save a web page, or a part of a webpage to the iPhone/Touch home screen. It’s a very convenient way to save websites you visit often. If a website does not have a specific WebClip icon then it will take an image of part of the site and use that. Well, creating your own custom icon for your website is pretty easy, so I wanted to tell you how to do it.
That’s it! When you add the icon to your home screen it will automatically be updated with the “glass” overlay to make it match the rest of the icons on the screen.
To see an example, go to my page and create a WebClip of it.
For almost the past year, animated wallpapers on Vista have been exclusive for Vista Ultimate owners. Stardock DeskScapes was released soon after which brought some amazing enhancements including dynamic and triggered wallpapers, the new .dream format, and more.
The first beta of DeskScapes 2.0 has arrived for Object Desktop users. DeskScapes 2.0 will run on any version of Vista that is Aero capable. Object Desktop subscribers will also get access to four exclusive dynamic .dreams.
You can find out more about subscribing to Object Desktop by visiting the link here: www.objectdesktop.com/
Stardock released WindowBlinds 6.02 yesterday. WindowBlinds allows users to completely change the looks and feel of both Windows Vista and XP by applying new visual styles.
WindowBlinds 6.02 is a maintenance release designed fix some reported bugs, improve skin changing speed, and add support for MyColors themes.
Users can purchase an enhanced registered version which adds additional functionality for $19.95 (or get it as part of Object Desktop which adds several additional programs and costs $49.95).
Free trial download and more information available at: www.windowblinds.net
With the ‘08 Presidential Election getting closer and closer, I took the time and created some countdown gadgets which will show you days remaining until election day. There are two downloads available. One is a standard gadget that will run on XP or Vista, and a Vista sidebar gadget. These were made with DesktopX 3.5 which easily creates and exports to Vista sidebar gadgets.
You can download the standard gadget from WinCustomize, or at the alternate links below.
A couple of weeks ago I got an invite to Photophlow. If you are a user of Flickr then this is a service you need to keep an eye on. Basically, Photophlow allows users to chat in “rooms” where everyone can browse or search images on Flickr and display photos for everyone to see.
It’s a fantastic way to share and discover new photos from a wide variety of users. One of my favorite features is the ability to post messages to Twitter while in the chat.
It also has potential for more “work” purposes as well. This would be a great way to meet with people and show them images of a product or service you offer. Right now Photophlow is still invite only, but you can request an invite from the Photophlow website. They also have an introduction video highlighting some of its features.
I just knew this was going to happen. Just a few days after Microsoft announced that they will give a free arcade game to Xbox Live gamers for the holiday network issues, someone decided that was just not good enough. Someone has filed suit against Microsoft claiming Microsoft should have expected the troubles because of the holiday season, and therefore are in breach of contract.
I don’t know whether to laugh at this story, or to get angry. Yes, I was upset that I wasn’t able to play Call of Duty 4 as much as I wanted, but that is certainly no excuse to file a lawsuit over.
If you received a new Xbox 360 or 360 game at Christmas, then you were probably disappointed at all the trouble you had connecting to Xbox Live during that time. Over the holiday period Xbox Live had widespread issues reportedly due to the heavy increase in traffic.
In an effort to make gamers happy, Xbox Live GM, Marc Whitten wrote a letter that was posted on Xbox.com and Major Nelson’s blog.
“At the same time we would like to offer a token of our appreciation to all of you in celebration of record success for the service. And as a thank you for your loyalty during this holiday period, we will be offering all of our Xbox LIVE members around the world access to a full Xbox LIVE Arcade game that will be available to download free of charge. In the coming weeks we will be sharing the specific details of this offer with you. ”
Hopefully users of Xbox Live will be able to choose their game of choice, and not be handed something at XBL’s choosing. We will have to wait for more details to see what will happen.
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