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11 months ago I wrote about the opening of an Apple retail Store in my home town Almere. I was excited and wanted to support this local dealer by using them as preferred supplier. After they opened, I wanted to buy a Mac Mini and went there twice, but they didn’t have any. When I wanted to upgrade my MacBook Pro with more memory, they didn’t have a 2GB memory module, so I had to order it online. Two weeks after the introduction of the updated iPod Touch (32GB) I went there, but they didn’t get any yet. Yesterday I went again and they still didn’t have any. The Media Markt store in town had them on sale last week (all sold out) and Apple delivers within a couple of days. The sales person of Warnerraven at the iCentre Almere said I could order it and wouldn’t even be required to take it, if I change my mind. But why should I order it there, wait and go back to the store to pick it up (difficult enough with their limited opening hours), while I can order it directly from Apple and have it shipped home for free? This store obviously can not afford to have Apple’s popular products on stock. The main reason for me to go to a local retail store is to get a product directly without waiting and shipping costs. Lately, I usually come home empty-handed and instead order online (often cheaper).
In some areas retail stores still make sense (products you want to try out and feel or where you need service), but otherwise many stores are just obsolete, wasting valuable space in our cities and increasing the price of products.

Update: I ordered it online from Apple and it was delivered really fast on Tuesday already.

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While I am waiting to be connected to the fiberglass network, I asked AlmeerNet about other providers next to KPN. I am currently with XS4ALL and for various reasons would prefer to stay with them. AlmeerNet confirmed that XS4ALL will also be on the fiberglass network in the fall but they couldn’t give a date or details. I am curious if XS4ALL is going to offer different services and better prices than KPN.

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I almost missed it, but today is the official download day for the next major release of Firefox. Of course you could download it any other day but the goal of the special download day is to set the record for most software downloads in 24 hours.

Firefox has been great since the first releases (even before it was called Firefox) and the new version 3 is even better. I’ve been using the version 3 beta releases on and off and am looking forward to get the final version.

Firefox download

If you can’t reach the official site, you can use the FTP server to download:
http://releases.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/releases/3.0/

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October last year, it was announced that our city would be the first fiberglass city in the Netherlands within the next 2 1/2 years. Announcements like this have often been made, also for other cities like Amsterdam and Deventer, so I was skeptical. But it is actually happening. First houses in Almere Haven have been connected and according to the site of AlmeerNet it is our turn in February 2009.

There is no information yet available about speed, services and prices. Currently I have an ASDL connection with 20 Mbit/s downstream and 1Mbit/s upstream for EUR 54,95 per month including VOIP. With a higher upstream speed I could host some sites and services at home and it should also make it more pleasant to work at home.

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Yesterday it was announced that Microsoft makes $45 Billion bid to buy Yahoo! Flickr, the popular photo sharing service started in 2004 in Canada and was acquired in March 2006 by Yahoo! Inc. The Yahoo! merger already brought some changes like the required use of Yahoo! IDs and censorship issues. Merging Yahoo! services like Flickr, del.icio.us and Yahoo! Groups with existing Microsoft services will certainly bring more radical changes. The Flickr community is already reacting and if Yahoo! accepts the bid, we will probably see much more resistance.

Media coverage:
Microsoft Makes $44.6 Billion Bid for Yahoo
Flickr Users Consider Their Potential Microsoft Overlords
A Giant Bid That Shows How Tired the Giant Is
Euro lawyers see tortuous road ahead for Microsoft’s Yahoo! bid
Flickr Rebellion Brews at Specter of M$ Acquisition
Flickr users panic over Yahoo!
The truth about Microsoft’s attempt to take over Yahoo
Microsoft Investors Don’t See Gains From Yahoo Deal
Yahoo! and the future of the Internet
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Yesterday I received following email scam from Russia, a variation on the common Nigerian and Lottery mails.

Hello,

My name is Elena, I have 31 years old and I live in Russian province.

I have a 6-years daughter, her father abandoned us and we live with my mother. Recently my mother lost job due to old age and our situation became very difficult.

During the last months the prices for gas and electricity became very high in our region and we cannot use it to heat our home anymore.

The winter becomes colder each day, we very afraid and we don’t know what to do.

The only accessible way for us heat our home is to use portable stove which give heat with burning wood. We have a lot wood in our region and this stove will heat our home all winter for minimal charges.

I work in library and after my job I allowed to use computer. I finded your address in internet and may be you can help us.

We need portable wood burning stove, but we cannot buy it in our local market because it is expensive for us. May be you have any portable stove which you don’t use anymore, we will be very grateful to you if you can donate its to us and organize transport of its to our address. This stoves are different, and they weight between 70-150kg.

I downloaded picture of me and my daughter to the free website and you can see it here:
http://mailrus.ru/free/users/elenafed/ourpicture.jpg
It is not very good quality, but it will show you how we look like.

I hope to receive your answer.

Elena.
Russia.

Michaël from Belgium answered her and they directly made some mistakes in the reply. Since then they adjusted the scam message and now directly include the photo link. In another variation she is asking for ‘old sleepings bags‘.

Let’s hope, that there are not too many people who actually loose some money on this, believing they actually help someone.

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When I was just browsing Google Maps again, I was surprised to the little bus and train icons and indeed they represent the bus stops and train stations in our town and even include the correct line numbers.

The satellite images seem to be from 2006 and are in a lower resolutions than the previous ones.

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Digital music distribution is unstoppable. More and more labels decide to take the business into their own hands. This week, Deutsche Grammophon, the classical music recording giant that’s owned by Universal Music Group, launched its own DRM-free online music store.

Read the interview with Jonathan Gruber (VP New Media, Classics & Jazz, Universal Music Group International) on createdigitalmusic.com.

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Today the first Apple store opened in Almere, well just a Premium Reseller, not a real Apple Store. But I am still glad about it. Until now only chains like Media Markt or Dixons sell Apple products in Almere and I would rather buy from a local reseller like Warnerraven.

click on image to go to Flickr

The store is a bit on small side and didn’t have as much choice as I had hoped for. It has a second and third level which I guess will probably be used for workshops.

I went to buy a Mac Mini (before Apple decides to discontinue it) to replace by old PowerBook as home-server/media server, but they didn’t have them yet. I am not in a hurry, so I will try it again next week.

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Half a year ago Jon Yongfook Cockle and John F.G. Cockle – a father and son duo of food enthusiasts – created Open Source Food. Open Source Food came to fruition because they wanted to create a place for people who are not professional cooks but just love food.

We want to share, learn and improve ourselves with the help of like-minded food lovers. Open Source Food is a platform for that.

What a great initiative. I think knowledge about cooking and cultural heritage like recipes and menus should be in the public domain as much as possible. It also offers a large group of people, who otherwise might only consume (like open source software, netlabel music) the chance to contribute to the commons. On our food blog Vegalicious we have also chosen to publish all of our recipes under a Creative Commons license and some other blogs have followed our example since then.

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