Is there anyone left out there in need of a GMail invite? I have run out of friends and I have an invite just begging to be given away. Leave a comment and I will pick someone today around 5pm. First comment gets it. This whole gmail contest scene is getting tired.

Several readers commented that the source in this entry was not exactly unbiased, but the reality is that the Army is stretched rather thin. It looks like they will be calling up some IRR folks this year.

The U.S. Army is planning an involuntary mobilization of thousands of reserve troops to maintain adequate force levels in Iraq and Afghanistan, defense officials said on Monday.

The move — involving the seldom-tapped Individual Ready Reserve — represents the latest evidence of the strain being placed on the U.S. military, particularly the Army, by operations in those two countries.

[via Reuters]

I hereby officially announce the Search Engine LoveDex. It’s the composite reporting tool every webmaster needs and Aimless Words has it. The idea is that everytime one of the bots from Yahoo, Google, or MSN stops by I record the visit in the LoveDex. Kinda stupid but I got the idea when I realized that MSNBot seems to stutter and forget where it has been in say the last 2 minutes. It visited me yesterday on my home page in excess of 30 times often within minutes of itself and from the same IP address. That is popularity if ever I have seen it so I threw together this silly little script during lunch to amaze and entertain.
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The MSNBot visited my main URL 32 times in an eighteen hour period yesterday. I am prolific when the mood strikes me but not that prolific. Even worse, it did not pick up the new content I have added below my main page so it was all for nothing (basically.)
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So, these guys have developed a toolbar that lets you AMPLIFY stuff. What, you ask, is AMPLIFYing? Well, it seems it lets you capture content such as pictures, audio, video, and text from the web and create rich media modules called AMPS. You can then share the AMPs through their online community or just store them locally for your own use.
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I really don’t understand the play everyone is giving AT&T’s recent announcement… Sure, it’s a decent deal but AT&T will then rape you with data charges. Engadget picks on Sprint in the quote below but Sprint (argueably the worst of all mobile carriers in the U.S.) offers unlimited data for like $10. Plus, although they forbid using the unlimited data plan for PC downloads, the reality is that they don’t care as long as you don’t use it everyday, all day.

Remembering that are still a few hardy individuals out there who don’t an all-in-one smartphone, AT&T Wireless is offering a package deal where you can get a Bluetooth-enabled iPAQ Pocket PC (either the h2210, the h4150, or the h4350) along with the similarly Bluetooth-enabled Nokia 6820 (pictured at right) and via the wonders of Bluetooth use the PDA to piggyback on the phone’s wireless Internet connection. This is of course in stark contrast to some of the other tightassed carriers (sorry, Sprint, but it needed to be said) which not only try to discourage their customers from doing this sort of thing, they actually specifically prohibit it in their Terms of Service.

[via Engadget]

Get a free, one-year subscription to Wired here. I am about six months into my first free sub and just renewed for another free year. I guess these guys have so much advertising revenue that they can afford to give away subs. They probably need to push total subs to that next advertising pricing tier.

Palm Addict is holding a contest where he is giving away an iPod or Palm/Clie to the winner of the user thought contest. How do you win? Simple - submit your thoughts on a Palm topic according to the instructions and you are entered in the contest. Your odds of winning are orders of magnitude greater at Palm Addict than in your local lottery so enter now!

This new Treo is IT if the rumours prove true. Bluetooth, high resolution, and a faster processor to boot. Let’s just hope they put a better battery in there and it would be nice if they also added a standard headphone output. That L adapter sucks.

According to the details listed on the picture, the next Treo will retain the same basic form factor and layout with a number of improvement, It will be powered by Palm OS 5.x, have 32MB of RAM and a 312 MHz ARM processor. It will include integrated Bluetooth and a 320×320 pixel, 65k color TFT display.

[via PalmInfocenter.com]

Wouldn’t you know it. Tivo is now offering the Home Media Option for free or as they put it, “as part of their standard monthly fee of $12.95.” I just spent $100 on this “upgrade” for my two Tivos. Great news if you don’t have the HMO feature yet, bad news if you do.
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