Microsoft's Qui veut gagner un PC?

Microsoft Indian Ocean Islands have organized a contest aimed at students aged 18-25, as part of their software piracy awareness campaign.

How to participate
- Send microsoft <student id> to 8386. (without the < >)
- You'll get the instructions to answer 5 multiple-choice questions by replying either 1, 2, 3 or 4. (Each sms costs around Rs 1.20)
- The first 100 contestants who have scored the most points from this sms competition will be eligible to participate in the next round. Your rank can be checked at play-sms.net You can play more than once to improve your rank, however you do not need to finish in the Top 10, only the Top 100. Sms competition started on 29 May & will last till 14th June.
- The 100 contestants will be contacted on the 15th June and called to the Octave Wiehe Auditorium, Réduit for the final on the 16th June at 18:30.
For the public, tickets for the event are at Rs 150 at Rezo Otayo.

The 10 finalists will be selected from the 100 contestants by a questionnaire round. There'll be two semi-finals with 5 participants each. & finally the final will be between the winners of the 2 semi-finals.

Prizes

- 10 finalists will get 1 month free Emtel broadband and Microsoft hardware prizes, & training vouchers.

- Second prize - Acer Travelmate TM5330 (link)
Processor: Celeron Dual-Core T1600 (1.6GHz, 1MB cache, 667MHz FSB)
Memory: 2GB DDR2
Screen: 15.4” WXGA TFT
Hard disk: 250GB (5400rpm)
Graphics: Intel GMA X4500M (64MB, up to 1.7GB)
DVD Super-multi drive, Wifi 802.11b/g/n, Bluetooth, 3xUSB, 1 LAN, 1 PCI, 5-in-1 card reader, 6-cell battery, 2.88kg. 
Full specs here.

- First prize - Dell Vostro A860 (link)
Processor: Pentium Dual Core T2390 (1.8GHz, 1MB cache, 533MHz FSB)
Memory: 2GB DDR2
Screen: 15.6”
Hard disk: 160GB or 250GB (5400rpm)
Graphics: Intel GMA X3100M (up to 384MB)
24x DVD/CD-RW combo or 8x DVD-RW, Wifi 802.11b/g, 2xUSB, 1 LAN, 1 PCI, 3-in-1 card reader, 4-cell & 6-cell battery, 2.46kg.
Full specs here.

So there you go. If you have any more questions, you can check the detailed instructions in this pdf. The related L’Express Dimanche article is here.
Good luck & I hope a UOM student will win this contest. :P
Btw, the next version of Windows is certainly not Windows Live nor Windows Mastermind and neither Windows Pro 2011. ;)

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USB Plasma Ball

Woohoo! Received a freebie from Rapidshare.com!!!

Got it by converting 30,000 RapidPoints earned from remote-uploading TV shows, movies & of course, Top Gear. ;)
Took around 1 month for the package to ship, directly from Switzerland. Yes, RS.com is in Scheiwz, not Deutschland.

Standard box, made in China. Nothing interesting, until a thing caught my eye.

PC & Mac compatible? No, there’s something much worst...

ROFLMAO!!!  xD

Getting back to the plasma, here's the orb switched off...

& tadaa!!!

This is awesome.

Just like lightning.

Touching the orb with one finger concentrates the arcs.

Multitouch splits them evenly.

The Physics Behind

Would you believe it that Nikola Tesla invented this thing… Wow! (He also invented teleportation in The Prestige)
The principle is pretty simple. The Argon-Neon gas mixture at low pressure is ionized with a very large electric field of several kV, which causes electric discharges in form of emission of photons. & when you hover your finger over it, the electric field is distorted by the capacitance of your body – this is very smiliar to the iPhone’s capacitive technology. Read the following sites for more:
- Wikipedia – Plasma Lamp
- PLASMA BALLS!
- PLASMA LAMPS - A simplified explanation with pictures of how these light-effect lamps work
- Plasma "Globe" Construction

But there are drawbacks. Plasma balls have health hazards – continued operation produces ozone gas, which is harmful to health – remember the peculiar smell near photocopy machines? Yeah, that’s ozone.
& there’s build-up of static charge… which is lethal for electronics. Yeah, it’s a paradox that a static-inducing device is meant to be USB-powered.

I'll be honest... Nothing beats the sheer awesomeness of the plasma arc – an incredible piece of technology, but in fact… totally useless. I'm already regretting ordering this. The reason why I started earning points was to get the top reward - a 10MP camera at 150k points... However RS.com removed the camera, & I decided to drop it, thus converting the points I had earned so far into this plasma ball.
Guess what now? RS.com just added back a 10MP camera at 150k... :(

More about → USB Plasma Ball

New Year Giveaway: 1 Month Rapidshare Account!

To brighten up your New Year 2009 & to reward my readers, I'm giving away one 1-month Rapidshare account, valid till 31st Jan 2009.

What you need to do?
Just COMMENT on this post.

Yeah as simple as that. You need to leave only ONE COMMENT - it can be anything: a simple thanks, Happy New Year, etc.
No spamming, no multiple comments - it will be automatically moderated.

The Rulz
1. Open to anyone of any age from any country.
2. Duration of giveaway is 24h. It will end on the 2nd of Jan at 8:00pm local time (UTC+5).
3. A random list will be generated using Random.org & the winner will be announced after giveaway is closed.
4. The winner will be announced in this post itself. So make sure to check back tomorrow night.
5. Winner will have 24h to contact me. Otherwise I'll move on to the next person in the list.

How did I come up with this contest?
Well, you should be checking Rapidshare news page more frequently. Here's what was posted on the 31st:

As every year, we have prepared our RapidPoints special for attentive readers of our news page. During the first hour of 2009 (Central European Time), you can convert 3333 RapidPoints into a new 30 days Premium account or a 30 days account extension.

A normal 1 month acc "costs" 10,000 RapidPoints. But at 3,333 you'd be getting 3 at the cost of one!!! That offer was only available for the 1st hour of 2009 at UTC+1 i.e. between 4 & 5am.
But that wasn't the only time - I also won another 2 accs on a forum. Lucky you say?
Hence I decided to give away one of these accounts. I hate stupid contests that ask you to record videos, subscribe to email feeds, make their promotion on Facebook/Twitter... WTF? Why complicate things? Keep it straight.
It's up to you decide whether you want to follow me on Twitter or subscribe to my RSS feeds.

Good luck to everyone & remember only one comment! :)

Update:
I want to ask Mr. Anonymous to please think up of a nickname (it’s not that hard…) & comment again. Thanks! :D

& the winner is…

KYU from kyusphere.moris.org

Congrats to Kyu & thanks to everyone for you participation. Better luck next time!
I request Kyu to please contact me on: Sent.

Some tips to all RS users:
- Don’t forget to activate it your account’s Security Lock to make it unphishable.
- Don’t share your acc with anyone coz RS.com bans accounts with multiple IPs using the acc at the same time.

Thanks again everyone & congats to Kyu! :P

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Widgetbucks

Ok, I’ve signed up with WidgetBucks, which is a company that displays interactive ads in a widget! (That’s the blue widget on the sidebar…)

WidgetBucks pays you in 2 ways - PPC & CPM. If you have used AdSense, then you must have an accurate idea of what these terms mean:

- PPC, or Pay-Per-Click ads. Each time a user from the U.S. or Canada clicks on a WidgetBucks ad widget on your site, you get paid.
- CPM, or Cost-Per-Thousand Impressions. When a user from outside the U.S. and Canada views one of your pages that contains a CPM ad from one of WidgetBucks' ad partners, you earn revenue.

It’s just like AdSense, but you only get paid if US users click on your ads, but nevertheless the CPM is worth it - that’s why I’ve signed up to check out the effectiveness of the CPM method since most of my traffic is outside of the US. Although these interactive ads mean that more people will be willing to click on them rather on those text ads.

Another advantage of WidgetBucks is that you get a $25 bonus when you sign up! & since minimum payout is at $50 only… you will be able to earn that much quite quickly.

& there’s also a referral program where you get 10% of your referral commissions…

Check the FAQ for more info & don’t hesitate to sign up!

Update: I've dropped out since I wasn't earning anything from CPM ads... :(

More about → Widgetbucks

RapidWLink Rapidshare Premium Downloader

You want to download a Rapidshare file. If you have Dynamic IP address, that’s easy – you just disconnect & reconnect your Internet connection, you get another IP address & now you can download another file. Even then, you have to wait 2.5 min & then enter a code before your download starts… & you don’t get the maximum download speed since you are downloading as a free user – you can’t use download managers!
If you have a Static IP address, you are doomed to wait 300 min before the next download. I wouldn’t recommend purchasing a Rapidshare Premium Account just for downloading a few files!

So what to do?
You can try to use a Rapidshare Premium Generator… but they are so popular that the accounts are over within an hour.
Another possible solution is to use a Rapidshare Mirror Service… your files will be downloaded but the mirror servers are so overloaded that it will take ages for the download to complete.

The solution…
WarezShares.com’s RapidWLink Rapidshare Premium Downloader is THE software to download Rapidshare files as a premium user without paying anything! Yes, it’s completely FREE!!!

How it works?
The RapidWLink (formerly known as Rapidwarez) Rapidshare Premium Downloader uses Rapidshare Premium accounts from Warezshares.com to allow you to download Rapidshare files as a premium user… meaning you can use download managers, pause/resume the download & most importantly you can download unlimited number of files!

Download RapidWLink 0.8 here: WarezShares.com RapidWLink (627 kb)
Mirror: http://rapidwlink.890m.com/RapidWLink_v08.zip

How to download:

- The first step you need to do is register at WarezShares.com forum. Everything comes at a price… but for RapidWLink, the only “price” you need to pay is 31 posts! To be able to use the RapidWLink Downloader, you need to have a minimum of 31 forum posts on WarezShares.com. Registration is completely free & you will get access to one of the most popular warez forums on the web. PLEASE, DO NOT SPAM on the forum. Saying “thanks” 31 times counts as spamming and you will get banned from the forum. Be active by posting software, movies and music. You can also participate in various other sub-forums to achieve your 31 posts count.


- After having downloaded the software & achieved your 31 posts, you can now download your Rapidshare files as a premium user! You will need to enter your username & password (exactly as your warezshares.com forum account). The software will connect to WarezShares.com & will check whether you have your required 31 posts count.


- You will then be redirected to the download page where you can paste your download link & start your download!


- If your download doesn’t start immediately, click on Update Account & new Rapidshare Premium Accounts will be retrieved from WarezLink.

Update: check RapidWlink stats here before download.

Rapidwarez minimum requirements:
- .Net Framework – download here.
- Microsoft Internet Explorer 7 – download here.


Please check the help section of the app if you are encountering download problems. Do not forget to backup your system32 files first if you need to copy dlls.

If you are still having problems, please post in the Problems & Feeds sub-forum at WarezShares.com

& as I mentioned before you can also use download managers if you can enable the “Monitor IE downloads” or "Integrate with browser" options.
I would recommend using Internet Download Manager:

Remember that you need to get your 31 posts counts before you can start your downloads & that there’s absolutely no restriction on how much you can download. Be active in the forum & you will be definitely rewarded! Good luck!

Update: Rapidwlink currently NOT working. Warezshares.com has taken down the app. Should be back very soon.

More about → RapidWLink Rapidshare Premium Downloader

Free International SMS

During my eternal quest for freebies, I’ve come across many sites that pretend to offer free sms but most of the time they never work…
Here are the only sites that I’ve found that offer truly FREE International SMS.

Callwave SMS (beta)

Callwave allows you to send 10 one-part sms per day for International users. For US, it’s unlimited. Requires registration & phone activation.
I prefer Callwave over other services since it provides you with a desktop widget for Windows Sidebar, Yahoo Widgets & Dashboard. (Callwave have just updated their service with Visual Voicemail but before that you could send up to 5 5-part sms per day!).

Click here for web interface.

Wadja

Wadja is a mobile community like Facebook. However, Wadja also allows you to send free sms to your friends. (I don’t how many sms you can send… but I think it’s unlimited)
Requires registration & phone activation. Register at wadja.com

Text4Free.net

Text4Free.net does not require any registration but the number of international carriers is limited. (for e.g. you have only Emtel for Mauritius)
Edit: Emtel users can still use the Emtelfun website to send up to 5 sms to Emtel numbers only.
Requires registration.
Thanks to Yashvin for the tip.

More about → Free International SMS