Woohoo! It’s Macworld and CES week! And since those two events have flooded the interwebs with news, unsurprising , this weeks roundup is going to have a slight focus on whats happening there.

Take a look at this week’s top stories after the jump.

Since there was so much news this week, I guess you could call this Roundup an extended edition.

I have 8 big stories for you this week, so lets get started.

1:  From : Read Write Web
Twitter Security Collapses; Obama, Fox and Britney Accounts Hacked
Monday, January 5, 2009

As any regular Twitter user should know, not only was twitter a victim of a phishing scam, but was also hacked this week. 33 prominent twitter accounts were taken over, and some had random messages posted on them Like @BarackObama, @britneyspears, @foxnews and @ricksanchezcnn and a few more. The hack was at first assumed to be related to the phishing attack, but was then revealed to be a different attack. Supposedly, according to Wired, a brute force attack was used on an account and then the hacker discovered it was a twitter staffers. He then proceed to use the email and password reset tools, after taking requests for particular accounts on Digital Gangster and then posting the passwords. To me, its kind of sad that twitter didn’t have any preventive measures in place to stop this attack, like locking you out for a short period of time after several incorrect password attempts before you could try again, or asking you to answer a captcha.

Overall for not taking preventive measures, twitter earns a:
fail whale!

While we are on the subject of Twitter, don’t forget to follow @theilife, so you can always know whats going on with the website!
You can also get a glimpse of my daily life, as well as my iLife activities by following @kjhobin.

2:  From : Gizmodo
Obama Asks Congress for Analog TV Shutdown Delay
Thursday, January 8, 2009

Obama as asked congress to delay the analog to digital TV switchover. His two main reason behind this is because of the lack of funding for the converter box program (they just ran out of money this week) and until more people can be educated about what the switch over actually means to them (And the cable companies, electronics   manufacturers, and electronics stores have not been very helpful in providing correct information about whats going on). An extended date has not yet been established. I have to agree with Obama and his transition teams opinion. The US is not ready yet for the transition, but we definitely need to keep working towards it, and it needs to happen some time this year. Maybe a simulcast period of both analog and digital would be helpful, before switching over to the ” analog nightlight” (See last weeks roundup for more info)

3:  From : Endgadget
Steve Jobs is still alive, says a hormone imbalance to blame for his weight loss
Monday, January 5th, 2009

Oh, Steve Jobs, every Apple fan’s favorite CEO, who designs Apple Products just for you! He even knows exactly what you what, which is whatever he says! And although Macworld 2009 still ran fine with out him, his absence was definitely noticed. For a while now, Apple fans have noticed that the CEO has become more and more frail. Monday, Jobs published a public letter about his health, and the Apple board of directors released a follow up statement. Jobs stated that his weight loss is due to a hormone imbalance and has already begun treatment. Everyone here at The iLife wishes Steve a speedy recovery.

4:  From : TechCrunch
When Livestreams Go Wrong: MacRumors Gets Hijacked
Tuesday, January 6, 2009

During this years Macworld snorefest keynote with Phil Schiller, Macrumors had a few issues with their liveblogging system. Hackers from what appeared to be 4Chan imageboard. They somehow managed to find a backdoor and insert messages into the stream and it quickly became NSFW with all the comments.  Luckily, there were plenty of other live blogs around to fill the void.

5:  From : Gizmodo
Apple Confirms $179 Battery Swap Cost for 17″ MacBook Pro
Tuesday, January 6, 2009

Shortly after announcing that the new 17″ Macbook Pro was going to have a non-removable battery, they also announced that you will be able to have the battery replaced by Apple if (and when) it fails. The cost of the service? $179. Luckily, that shouldn’t be anytime soon, since your supposed to be able to get 1,000 charge cycles out of it, which means it will last about 5 years. While I’m still not a fan of non-removable batteries, $179 for the change (including the battery) isn’t that bad, seeing as a regular laptop battery normally costs around $80, and the new MBP’s is even bigger (meaning more expensive, plus the cost of labor (and when you look at the price of changing a iPod’s battery at $100, you can get a rough estimate of how much that is costing you).

6:  From : Technologizer
Stevenote? Here’s Your Stevenote. Or, More Specifically, Your Woznote.
Tuesday, January, 6, 2009

Well, even if Steve Jobs wasn’t able to attend Macworld this year, there was a Stevenote, just of a different type, from Steve Wozniak . Woz had his own mini-keynote at the Axiotron booth. Axiotron is the maker of the Modbook pro, a touch screen Macbook Pro, and since Woz recently joined Axiotron’s board of advisors, it was a natural fit for him to help demo the product. People who were around for they demo remarked how much you could see that Woz enjoyed the product. He even remarked that it reminded him of the Newton.

7:  From : The Official Google Blog
Introducing Picasa for Mac (at Macworld!)
Monday, January 5, 2009

Google has finally released a version of their popular photo management and basic editing software, Picasa, on the Mac, as a competitor to Apple’s iPhoto, it at least decides to play nice with your iPhoto library by not make any edits to those photos stored in iPhoto. In order to edit iPhoto pictures in Picasa, Picasa will ask to make a copy, or it won’t let you do any at all. Picasa may not have all of the new features that iPhoto 2009 has, but it comes close. Picasa supports face recognition and geotagging when you sync your photos to Google’s online sharing site, Picasa Web Albums, which has been a feature for a while. You can still quickly pick out photos with faces in them when your in the software, just not assign a name to a face like you can online. The only features I really see missing when you compare iPhoto to Picasa is the ability to sort your photos by place, the ability to create travel maps based off your geotagging and shorting your photos by event. Overall, Picassa is a solid choice to orginise and edit your photos.

8:  From : Gizmodo
Palm Pre: First Look and Details
Thursday, January 8, 2009

Palm has just announced their newest Smartphone, and entry back into being a competitor in the handheld market, the Palm Pre. The Pre will have multitouch support, has a slide out keyboard with Treo like keys, and will run Palm’s newest OS called “Web OS”. It’s “designed to seamlessly integrate all your web content into one interface.” It will be released on the Sprint Network in the first half of 2009. Pricing has not yet been established, but it’s rumored that it will be over $200. Another unique feature of this phone is that there will be an option to use a indutive charger (like these on electric tooth brushes) to charge the phone, so you never have to connect cables. All you have to do is buy the inductive charging back and the “Touchstone” charger, prices have not yet been released for these accessories. There will also be the ability to charge via microUSB for places where induction charging isn’t the best idea (like a car or any other moving object). There is no flash support in the browser or video suport in the camera yet, but it is also rumored that that will show up before the final release. People who are getting a chance to try out the phone at CES are amazed at how usable the smartphone is.  If you want to see more of the Pre, check out Gizmodo’s Demo Video’s. To me, this phone looks awesome, and it also looks like its going to give the iPhone a run for its money. Check back later in the year for a full review.

Hope you enjoyed this week’s extended Roundup: Macworld / CES Edition.
Be sure to check back here at theilife.com every Friday at Noon Eastern for your weekly Roundup!
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–Keith Hobin