Kindles Are Going to Be More Common on Campus than Cheap Beer

Left: The new $79 Kindle. Right: The Kindle Fire. You'll be seeing a lot of both on campus next semester.

Let it be known that September 28, 2011 was the day that that tablets and e-readers were introduced to the mainstream student market.

E-Ink Kindles

Amazon today announced three new models of its E-Ink based Kindle, including an entry-level model for just $79. For just $20 more, you can pick up a touch screen model, and you can add free 3G to that for a $50 premium. Three Kindle models, from $79-$149, and they are all going to sell like mad.

For those kinds of prices, the device would probably pay for itself over a four year college career through relatively-inexpensive ebook pricing, at least for students who have to buy a lot of novels for classes. There's really no excuse not to get an ereader now.

Kindle Fire

The real star of the show though is the Kindle Fire, Amazon's new 7" touchscreen tablet. It's $200. This will be the first tablet not made by Apple to be widely successful.

It's an Android tablet, but much like the Nook Color (which seems so quaint now), you wouldn't know it. The interface is heavily skinned, and users won't even be able to shop on the Android App Market. Instead, you'll have one-click access to Amazon's App Market and its massive music, video, and book catalogs. Unfortunatley, for the video marketplace you'll really need to get a $79 Amazon Prime subscription ($39 for students), as the discounted free six month student demo accounts don't include video.

The browser is very clever, processing web pages on Amazon's servers, and sending compressed data to the Kindle to improve load times. It's reminiscent of the mobile Opera browser, and it'll be interesting to see how it functions in practice.

I've played around with 7" tablets before, including the original Galaxy Tab and the the RIM Playbook (which has very similar hardware to the Fire), and I've come to realize that for the core competencies of a tablet, a 10" screen is the way to go. For consuming videos, web pages, and images, and especially for PDF class readings, there is a distinct advantage to the larger screen on an iPad.

That said, the Fire's $200 price tag allows it to be a Trojan Horse for college students. Millions of students will return to school in January having received this for Christmas, and I really think it has the potential to make tablet computing a mainstream activity on college campuses. Once students become accustomed to incorporating a tablet into their workflow, they can gradually upgrade to more-expensive 10" iPads or Android tablets. 

Unfortunately, it doesn't seem that any of these devices will be available until November, but preorders will be opening today.

Will you be getting your hands on the new Amazon hotness? Let us know in the comments.

[Via This is My Next and Gizmodo]

A Guide to Facebook's Recent Changes

"Now, News Feed will act more like your own personal newspaper," says Facebook engineer Mark Tonkelowitz in a blog post.If you've been on Facebook in the last couple of weeks, you've probably noticed some dramatic changes in your newsfeed's layout. What with the ticker, revamped friends lists, subscribe button, and more, Facebook has been rolling out new features at a dizzying pace-- it can be hard to keep up. Here's a guide to get you up to speed. 

1. There's no longer separate feeds for "Top News" and "Recent News." Instead, all stories will show up in a unified newsfeed, but top updates will be designated by a blue upper-left corner. If you haven't logged in to Facebook for a few days (gasp!), you'll first be presented with a list of the top stories since you last logged in. Otherwise your newsfeed will display stories in chronological order. You can tell Facebook if you disagree with its ratings; just click in the top left corner to mark or unmark an item as a top story. Taking a cue from Twitter's timeline, a refresh button at the top will update automatically to show you when you have new stories. 

2. A new real-time "Ticker" will show you all of your friends' activities, live. All "lightweight" activities (liking a status, joining a group, listening to a song, etc.) go to the Ticker. Click on a story in the Ticker to see a pop-up with more details and to interact with a post without leaving your current page. Also, when you are using an app or playing a game, a special app ticker will appear showing you updates relevant to the game or app you are using.

3. A number of new features have been added to Friends Lists. First, everyone has three default lists: Close Friends, Acquaintances, and Restricted. Add someone to "Close Friends" to ensure everything they post shows in your newsfeed. If you want to limit the updates you get from a person, add them to Acquaintances. Finally, friends in your "Restricted" list can only see posts you make public-- the perfect spot for parents, old teachers and employers! Facebook has also added "Smart Lists," which take information that you've added to your profile to create lists of friends who go to school or work with you, live near you, or are family. For example, if you list "New York, NY" as your current city on your profile, a list called "New York Area" will be created for you, which initially will include all friends who also list New York as their current city. You can manually add and remove friends in smart lists. You can also merge lists, so your old lists can transition to the new smart lists with ease.

4. You can now "subscribe" to a person or a fan page's public updates, and people can subscribe to you, all without adding you as a friend-- if you allow it. This sounds like a feature geared more towards public figures than the average Facebook user, but if you want to opt in, you can do so here. When you subscribe to someone, you can choose what kind of updates from them you want in your news feed. Since you are automatically subscribed to your friends, you can go to their profile, click the "Subscribed" button in the top right and filter the updates you see from them as well. 

So, what do you think of these changes to Facebook? Love them? Hate them? Let us know in the comments!

How to: Repurpose Free T-Shirts

Free t-shirt! Wooo! Image courtesy of Flickr user Kirrly Robert. Licensed under CC BY 2.0.

There's nothing quite as common on campus as a free t-shirt (except maybe free pizza). Between orientation events, homecoming, Greek life, and clubs, you're likely to have drawers stuffed full of incredibly bright screen print before your first semester at college is up.

Though some of these shirts are worth keeping, the vast majority of them are most likely not shirts that you want to keep wearing, either because you got the wrong size or they don't hold up well in the wash. However, this doesn't have to be the end of the t-shirt's life. Here are four options to repurpose your worn-out t-shirt without giving it away.

Tote bag: If you need a reusable bag for grocery shopping which folds up small, try turning out worn-out t-shirt into a tote. This project is incredibly clever because the author takes advantage of the t-shirt's structure to turn it into a bag without the use of a sewing machine. If you're like me and hate the waste of plastic produce bags, this seems like a good alternative--particularly because the bag is so crushable that it can just be shoved into the bottom of your backpack.

Laptop case: This t-shirt to laptop case transformation isn't super well-documented, but it's pretty easy to figure out. Using a little big of sewing and smart folding, this hack turns a pocket t-shirt into a laptop cover that stores your bag and provides a space to store a charger. If you're taking your machine with you in a bag that's not designed specifically for computers, this is a good way to keep it from getting scratched up. If you don't have your own sewing machine and don't want to sew by hand, try stopping by your campus art studio or theater costume closet--chances are that both places have a machine that you can use for a few minutes.

Throw pillow: The worst part about dorm furniture is that they don't pad the arms--all of the couches in my apartment are impossible to sit on because the wooden arms jut into my back. To fix that, make a t-shirt throw pillow. Because the pillow's not likely to see much stress, you're safe using just a plain-jane needle and thread rather than digging up a machine. Voilà--instantly better furniture.

Underpants: I'm not saying you need upcycled underwear to put a cat on your butt. I'm just saying that it's awesome. (This also requires some more impressive sewing skills, but the results are pretty awesome.)

Man on the Street: What is Intel Hyper-Threading Technology? (Presented by Intel)

Need a laptop? We've teamed up with Intel to bring you the HackCollege Laptop Chooser. If you share the Laptop Chooser, you'll be entered to win a Intel Core i5-powered Samsung Series 9 Notebook!

What The Improved Google Hangouts Features Mean For Students

This would probably be more fun with friends, but you get the idea.Google+ might not be your go-to social network just yet, but new features and extensions available for its Hangouts video group chat feature may be a boon for group projects and collaboration.

Hangouts has always been great for group roundtables (like Sean's with the Chronicle of Higher Education) but now you can use it for screen sharing, Google Docs collaboration, and even group sketching. Imagine, instad of asking all four members of your randomly-assigned class group to trek to the library or coffee shop, everyone can hop on a group video chat, fire up a Google Doc, and hash out ideas from the comfort of their dorm rooms. Though screen sharing and collaborative SketchUp doodling might not be as frequently useful, they're impressive additions for the young platform. 

If that isn't exciting enough, it's probably just the beginning. The newly-released Hangouts API brings with it the promise of future innovation from the developer community, and the recently-added ability to use Hangouts from your iOS or Android device means you can collaborate from anywhere.

Unfortunately, the new features are still rolling out, so in order to see the new extras, you'll need to use this link.

I admit that I basically stopped using Google+ after the sheen wore off, but Google is clearly pouring resources into the project and innovating at a breakneck pace, so we'll definitely be keeping our eye on the network. 

Have you used Google+ for collaboration with classmates? What might you use instead? Let us know in the comments!

Deals of the Week: 9/26/11-10/2/11

Try Lastpass Premium for 6 months, free of charge! Image from Lastpass

Need a laptop? We've teamed up with Intel to bring you the HackCollege Laptop Chooser. If you share the Laptop Chooser, you'll be entered to win a Intel Core i5-powered Samsung Series 9 Notebook!

Welcome to the second week of "Deals of the Week," a new series where we will be giving you the inside scoop about the hottest bargains on the web. The deals we feature will be relevant to college students in some way or another, whether it's a price drop on a note-taking app or a coupon for groceries. We will focus on online promotions and discounts so that everyone can take advantage of them, no matter where you attend school. Keep looking out for new "Deals of the Week" every Monday!

• Cross-platform and cross-browser password manager Lastpass is giving university students 6 months of Lastpass Premium. 

• Mac note-taking app NoteLook is $1.99 for a limited time, previously $9.99.

• Photo Frame Calendar is now free in the iTunes app store, previously $0.99.

• Calendar app Agenda is now $0.99 for a limited time, previously $1.99.

• Read it Later Pro is 40% off in the iTunes app store. Previously $4.99, now $2.99.

• Get 10% off e-Textbooks at Coursesmart with code RETAILMENOT10 through 9/30.

• Get 20% off one item at Barnes and Noble with code P7E8H9K.

• Get $10 off your order of $50 or more at HP with code HPSAVE10 through 10/31.

• Save $10 off your online purchase of $50 or more at Foot Locker with code LKS1SR23 through 9/30.

• Get 15% off all orders at Perfumania with code STUDENTRATE.

OS Tips – How to Take Screenshots in Mac OS X

Read on to find out how I did this!Need a laptop? We've teamed up with Intel to bring you the HackCollege Laptop Chooser. If you share the Laptop Chooser, you'll be entered to win a Intel Core i5-powered Samsung Series 9 Notebook!

While this might be old hat to some of you, for those who don’t know, it’s incredibly useful to know how to take screenshots of your device. Let’s say you’ve got a PowerPoint presentation for a class, and you can’t save the image to insert it into your slide deck. What do you do? Screenshots to the rescue! Here’s a list of all the native OS X screenshot functions, how to activate them, and how it’s been useful for me. Important note: All Mac screenshots that save an image produce a .PNG file titled with the time and date you took the screenshot that saves automatically to your desktop. For screenshots that copy to your clipboard, just paste (using Command+V), onto whatever application you wish. If you’re worried about getting it to work, you’ll know you successfully captured your screen/window/area by the ensuing camera snapping sound.

Save Screenshot of Entire Screen as a File: Shift+Command+3. This is most useful if you want to post pictures of your entire screen to Flickr/blogs to show off your cool desktop and all your various menu bar applications. I’ve also found it nice for showing others how I arrange my windows in my workflow. Altogether though, the utility is rather limited.

Save Screenshot of Specific Window as a File: Shift+Command+4, then hit space. This is really, really handy! Mac OS X changes the screenshot cross cursor to a camera and automatically recognizes windows. You just choose whichever window you want, hover over it (you’ll know which one by the obvious blue glow), and click to save the image. I use it all the time to capture great focused screenshots for HackCollege, or for showing friends and family what settings need to be checked/turned on to enable additional functionality in their applications.

Save Screenshot of Arbitrary Area as a File: Shift+Command+4, then click and drag the area you wish to capture using your mouse. Remember that PowerPoint dilemma I brought up earlier? This is the solution to that problem. Let’s say an image is displayed via Flash on a website. You can’t save it, so just use this screenshot capture to get what you need and make your presentation shine! It’s also handy for capturing only a portion of a window to save the extra step of cropping an image later. Remember that the numbers below the cursor refer to your capture's pixel dimensions; the top number is length while the bottom number is width.

In case you don’t want to produce a file and just need to copy the capture to the clipboard, just hold the Ctrl key while invoking the aforementioned keyboard shortcuts. They all work the same way but just copy to the clipboard instead. Additionally, you can use Grab, a program found within your utilities folder, to perform the same tasks via a GUI. After you take a screenshot using Grab, it spits out an untitled image document that you can then save wherever you wish. Grab includes the additional functionality of a timed screen capture if that's of interest to you. Most of the time though, I find the basic keyboard shortcuts more than powerful enough for my needs. 

One last thing: There's third-party software out there for taking screenshots with far more advanced options than the ones natively available in OS X. Try Paparazzi (capture entire webpages - free), Skitch (annotate, edit, and share screenshots - free), Layers (save windows in your screenshots as separate layers in Photoshop - $24.95), or LittleSnapper (manage and edit all your screenshots - $39.99) if you're interested.

How have screenshots helped you produce better work? Are there any additional tips that I missed? Let us know in the comments!

App of the Week – Assign Keyboard Shortcuts to Mac Multi-Touch Gestures with BetterTouchTool

BetterTouchTool has a great two-pane preferences window that's very easy to navigate.Need a laptop? We've teamed up with Intel to bring you the HackCollege Laptop Chooser. If you share the Laptop Chooser, you'll be entered to win a Intel Core i5-powered Samsung Series 9 Notebook!

We’ve mentioned BetterTouchTool here on HackCollege before (Luke uses it and I’ve mentioned it here), but we’ve never actually gone in depth into just exactly how powerful and useful it can be. I always talk about how I love Windows and the Alt key so much, but BetterTouchTool delivers a considerable counterpunch in the form of ultra-customizable mouse gestures that can be just as effective. So today, I’m devoting an App of the Week feature to this wonderful little program that supercharges your Trackpad/Magic Mouse’s utility.

Platform Availability: Mac OS X 10.6 and up

Cost: It’s free! Download it here!

What it is: If you go into system preferences, you’ll see 12 or so options for configuring your Mac’s Trackpad/Magic Mouse. But all you can do is check Apple’s boxes and turn on/off a limited set of functionalities. Do you ever wish that you had more thorough control over the Trackpad? BetterTouchTool opens up Pandora’s box and gives you as many options as you can dream up – literally.

Read on to see the entire review!

Click to read more ...