We're fairly certain if you take a random sample of folks in their 70s and ask them to describe what BitTorrent is, the majority of them will tell you to hush up because you're interrupting Matlock. Even folks much younger who aren't entrenched in the tech world aren't likely to be all that familiar with BitTorrent, but they're all fair game for sue-happy firms looking to score quick settlements for big media.
No iPhone? No problem! Amazon just scored its first exclusive desktop software courtesy of DistinctDev, makers of the hit iOS game The Moron Test. You can now download the popular title to your PC or Mac, though if you don't own an iPhone to begin with, you may have already passed (Zing!). We jest, and actually, The Moron Test is also available on Android and Windows Phone 7, which still won't come as any consolation if you're rocking a feature phone.
Firefox 4 has been a long time in the making but tomorrow (March 22, 2011) it will finally bid farewell to the protracted development process once and for all. If for some odd reason some of you simply can’t bear the wait any longer, you can download the final version a day in advance. Download links across the jump.
More powerful smartphones and the emerging tablet market have both contributed to the uber popularity of mobile apps, but as it turns out, over a quarter (26 percent) of all apps downloaded in 2010 were used just once, according to Localytics, a Boston-based software company.
"Localytics studied the thousands of Android, iPhone, iPad, BlackBerry, and Windows Phone 7 apps using its real-time app analytics service," Localytics said. "For all new customers of an app in 2010, Localytics looked for the first time each customer used the app and whether or not there was any follow-up usage through January 26, 2011... The resulting analysis shows that for customers using an app for the first time between January and March, about 22 percent of them never open the app again. In the second and third quarters, the rate of one-time usage is flat at 26 percent. One-time usage grows to over 28 percent in the fourth quarter, but some of those customers may still use the app again in early 2011."
Hit the jump to find out why this might not be a bad thing.
Straight and to the point, BitTorrent Inc. announced that the BitTorrent Mainline and uTorrent client software combine to serve 100 million users every month, TorrentFreak reports.
On any given day, 20 million users from over 220 countries load up one of the clients, while also distributing 400,000 new clients every day. That adds up to a lot of users, and a lot of game demos and Linux distros (and perhaps one or two illicit downloads...).
"This is an exciting day for our team. Our vision is to build a complete technology ecosystem comprised of software, content, and devices designed to connect modern creators with a massive digital audience," BitTorrent CEO Eric Klinker said. "This milestone highlights the size of our user base and the power of our software."
Both clients are free, though it's estimated BitTorrent Inc. rakes in millions of dollars each year through the optional installation of an accompanying toolbar.
Verizon on Monday announced it has gone and tripled the speed of its FiOS service to 150/35 megabits per second (Mbps), making it the fastest mass-market broadband service in the country.
"The new 150/35 Mbps FiOS Internet offer establishes a new benchmark for high-speed Internet in America, and paves the way for a flurry of emerging bandwidth-intensive applications to reach mainstream status," said Eric Bruno, Verizon vice president of product management.
We have to call out Verizon for touting this as a mainstream option, because at $195/month (with a one-year service agreement), the little old lady who lives down the street isn't going to jump on this, nor will most other residents around the block. But for those who do pony up for the fastest Internet service around, Verizon says they will be able to download 20 high-resolution photos (100MB) in less than a five and a half seconds. Uploading those same photos would take less than 23 seconds.
"Our new 150/35 Mbps offer will also support burgeoning bandwidth-intensive applications such as Internet video to TV and PC, 3D TV and movie downloads, high-definition and real-time video conferencing, and online data backup," said Bruno.
The game was released on Friday for Android users on the cross-platform app store, GetJar, and after the servers had trouble keeping up, Rovio chucked the app into the Android Market.
Angry Birds is free for Android users, whereas the iPhone version still costs 99 cents. It is, however, supported by ads on Android.
"Paid apps have not done very well on Android," Rovio explained in a Twitter post.
Nevertheless, Rovio plans to bring a paid, ad-free version of Angry Birds to Android sometime in the future.
It never fails: Someone always sends you a link to grab materials off of (or upload materials to) an FTP site the moment that you’re away from your desktop which, of course, has your favorite FTP client of choice just sitting right there in the start menu. Sure, you could manually try to connect to a FTP site via your browser (or Windows explorer), but you’re kind of stuck if you want to do anything more than just download a file or two. Or two hundred.
Try not to fret, however, for FTP applications can receive the same kind of "web app" treatment as most software applications nowadays! And I'll be taking a look at one such app after the jump.
Looking to change it up a little? Hey, change is good (imagine wearing the same pair of briefs everyday), and if you've got a hankering to shelve Firefox or Chrome for awhile and try something new, now is as good of a time as any. Opera Software just updated its Opera browser to version 10.63 with a new JavaScript engine that's supposedly 50 percent faster than in Opera 10.50.
The latest release also includes enhanced support for advanced Web standards, like HTML5 and WebM video, search suggestions for selected providers has been fine tuned, and Opera can now prompt you to share your location to make better use of geolocation-supporting sites.
In addition, Opera Software vaporized a box full of bugs, everything from goofiness with the user interface (no more Opera Link freezing on startup, for example) to a handful of security fixes.
Video below (turn AdBlock off if you can't see it, or better yet, disable AdBlock altogether for MaximumPC.com).
Is there a special, unwritten set of rules for downloading freeware? I’d like to think there are—for me, at least. For even though I’m “that guy” at Maximum PC, perhaps the only (former) editor to actually come close to pushing past one’s monthly Comcast bandwidth limits, I still have to keep my trips through freeware land in some kind of perspective. And you should too.
So what, gentle sir or madam, compels you to grab a particular piece of software?
That’s the crux of what I’ll be tackling in this week’s column—the first in a long time, mind you, thanks to an unruly show schedule on my part (I missed you too). But I digress. In my non-writing time, I’ve been doing a bunch of downloading, analyzing, and tweaking on the various devices I own, and I’ve noticed that all of my extended file-hunting sessions always have a few themes in common.
maximumpc: New mice from Microsoft add Windows keys and the ability to scroll through open apps all from the mouse: http://t.co/dhjGzKek7O52 min 26 sec ago
maximumpc: Study shows most desktop users barely touching Windows 8 apps. http://t.co/UgzL9IKATB2 hours 7 min ago
maximumpc: @Logun0 It's hard for us to tell you why other sites are reporting different numbers at different resolutions.2 hours 45 min ago