The internet has… changed people. People on the web expect everything to be free, while the thought of paying for something is near blasphemy. Even I at times have seriously questioned what is the need for me to pay for anything on the web? Then I remember this funny concept, a business needs to make money.

Today labels are in a tough spot. The web is allowing for extreme ease of sharing music content through bit torrents, playlists and even email. Downloading an illegal track of Katy Perry’s can be as simple as a google search. This is effectively loss revenue for labels. In effect your stealing, but that is ok?

Michael Arrington seems to think so, even going as  far as to say he should be paid to illegally download and distribute music. Michael suffers from what I like to call the “free” syndrome. For years people have bought music in a hard copy format. But as we become more dependent on the web and our expectation is that everything should be free has spilled over to music. So now labels are expected to make something out of nothing, even though there …

I was hoping that I would only have to post 1 pre-game prank list. But no, people have decided to start early this year. Even with the recession, there is always enough time to post about how little munchins with large heads that look like Obama will take over the earth. Here are some more of the March 31st pranks:

• A new platform, PHP on Rails has been annouced. Its code name? Phails.
• The Alcoholics(AA) and Narcotics Anoymous(NA) have combined to create a new fellowship to simply ‘A’.
• Google will be annoucing a Google/Yahoo/Live mashup that allows you to search all three engines from one page.
• ViralURLs is planning on buying Twitter.
• Twitter will will follow people for you, and not let you remove them.
• iJustine will marry Chris Prillo, creating a super web TV couple. The wedding will, of course, be streamed.
• Ever need a way to mix bacon and sex? Try Bacon Lube.
• Genetically Modified Trees will be able to give directions to lost hikers.
• Microsoft will be buying Apple.
• Twitter will be limiting Tweets to one tweet per day.
• A Service will text message you when you are …
  

April Fools day hasn’t even started, and we are already getting pranked. Check out the Pre-Game Pranks. 

• TheFunded last week wrote a notice saying it would be shutting down. Techcrunch breaks the prank and annouces it is not shutting down.
• ZDNet gives their own twist on an April Fools gag by annoucing the ‘fake’ winner for the  $4.7 billion National Broadband Network contract.
• Because Australia is ahead of us, Google has already launched its gBall for Australian footbal users.
• Smashing Magazine broke a story about Internet Explorer 8.1 and its ability to act like multiple browsers.
• SitePoint annouces that the internet will reboot at 11:59 UTC on April 1st.
• PSS annouces IVR-SmartASS – SMART Assisted Self Service System to make sure callers on customer service lines don’t lie.
• You can flip any YouTube video upside down by adding ‘&flip=1′ to the end of the url.

Check back here for more April Fools fun after the real game starts. Then, after the game, we’ll be wrapping all of it up.

This is a friendly public service announcement from everyone here at TechGeist HQ, that April Fools is coming up, and so the tech news is about to become very very interesting. Not true, in any way, but assuredly interesting. We all recall the Gmail hoaxes of past [my favorite: printed emails mailed to you], and the other hooliganisms of the past. Don’t get taken, have fun, and laugh a little. This recession isn’t making room for too many laughs, but this is a good chance to grab a few while you can.

Ars Technica recently did an interview with Gmail’s product manager, Todd Jackson, about Google Labs, the ever-present beta and future of Gmail. Ars Technica just did a fabulous job interviewing Jackson, so it would be redundant to reiterate and re-blog what he said, but if you’re looking for it: go here. What I want to discuss right now is something in particular that Jackson said, which could be considered a very valid point about the term “beta”.

The beauty of applications is their malleable quality: they can be constantly and consistently updated, tweaked or changed at nearly any time. Major updates can be pushed within seconds to a user base of millions and the browsers themselves don’t care about specific website updates, because they blindly display whatever content  is presented. Also, the developer doesn’t have to worry about people updating to the latest version or people having to install more files on their computer. It’s a win-win situation for everyone involved. Web applications and, in essence, …

The only upside to Facebook is the fact that you preapprove everyone that can see your data. Twitter however, doesn’t have this privacy feature and Mark Cuban has just figured that out. Valleywag just recently annouced that he has been fined $25,000 for slagging referees by the NBA. 

This once again gives us a reminder that everyone can see everything you post on Twitter. If you plan on posting things that are private, you might want to set up Facebook with your close friends. Just make sure to restrict wall updates to people that you know won’t fine you for talking smack about people. Or just keep it to email.

Google’s plan to provide funding to “support innovation and encourage promising new technology companies” might be a way for the juggernaut to extend its controlling tendrils even further into the technology world.

What if instead of innovating to make more money, people who were about to launch lucrative projects came to you and essentially gave you a percentage of the cut? That’s one of the ways in which Google Ventures could operate. If a company is developing a technology that Google wants, Google could set the start-up company up to become financially reliant on Google. Additionally, Google would be in a prime position to buy out the fledgling company (who doesn’t like the notion of becoming a millionaire over night?). Google would be whispering honeyed words to the start-up: “Oh, it will still be your development team, and everything will be run the same way. Everyone will just make lots and lots more money.” But at the end of the day, it’s just one more awesome innovation controlled by those evil geniuses at Google.

Find more about Google on Techgeist.

In an act that copies what most 3rd party applications have already put in place, Twitter has finally expanded the replies section of the Twitter homepage to include mentions. Anyone who has followed Twitter already knows that its interface is often lacking in the way of features. This has spurred on the use of 3rd party applications that provide more features ontop of Twitter, and often in a smaller, cleaner interface. It lends someone to wonder what exactly is Twitter doing? They have said that they have enough captial to survive for a long time without monetization, but has it also closed its doors to changing things site wide?

This expansion of the Twitter reply feature has been the first change of the Twitter interface for a long time. Although, supposidly there is a new version coming out soon that will provide a search bar at the top of the screen, not much has changed about the popular messaging network. 

So, during this break of innovation and changing design, what do you think we should change on Twitter? What are the features that you think should be added to Twitter that everyone would benefit …

Upon first glance, news that Google is pulling tethering applications from the AndroidMarketplace may come as quite a shock as it suggests Google is taking an Apple-like position on applications. This could not be further from the truth. While regulations on what can be sold through Marketplace make Google appear to be restrictive, we as geeks know much better.

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