One very cold morning in December 2011, we assembled on Newcastle Quayside for a selection of group photos taken by Angela Carrington of The Bigger Picture. It was just 2 degrees but with the wind chill felt like minus 10.

We were all very glad of the little barrow, next to the Pitcher and Piano, serving hot coffee.

We’re expecting one or two new additions to the family over the next couple of months so we’ll be down there again…but in warmer weather this time.

We’d always intended to replace the stock photo used to get the site up and running. A new client commented that as we provide a personal service, it would be nice to see a picture of us on the website homepage. No sooner said than done.

There have been increasing reports of telephone scams involving your computer. People have lost hundreds of pounds.

The most common is a call supposedly from Microsoft claiming that your computer is infected with a virus. The caller will almost certainly be foreign and will ask for access to your computer so they can fix the problem. Usually you will be asked to go to a very convincing website and click on a link.

Once they are in, you will be held to ransom. If you don’t pay, they will delete files or render your computer unusable. Meanwhile, in the background, they are stealing your identity and any credentials you use on-line; e.g. your bank details, eBay, PayPal, Facebook etc…

Microsoft WILL NOT call you to tell you your computer is infected – frankly, nor will anyone else – unless it’s your IT provider who, like us, will be notified by software protecting your computers that you have a possible infection. The difference is, you’ll know who they are.

Most of the people who are being scammed are elderly or vulnerable. Computers are still considered a ‘black art’ by some and they don’t realise these scam calls aren’t real.

If you get one of these calls, there are several options:

• Be polite and tell them you’re not interested.
• Be very rude and speak expletives slowly and carefully until they hang up.
• Tell them you’re an IT professional – they’ll hang up at that point.
• Have some fun if you aren’t watching Corrie or X Factor – play along with them for a while but DON’T go anywhere near your computer or do anything they say. Tell them you have however and that there are all sorts of warning messages. They won’t know or understand why or how this is happening. After a while, in a calm voice, thank them for calling and advise them that you’ve been waiting for their call and that their location has been tracked.

It’s vital to find out what your customers think of the service or product you provide; just ask Linda at The Secret Service and she’ll tell you.

Sometimes they will tell you more on paper than face-to-face so we sent out a short questionnaire. Frankly we were delighted with the outcome as it confirms we are achieving what we set out to do.

So take a look at our customer feedback by clicking on Survey Results

Today sees the announcement of the death, at just 56, of a truly remarkable man who was instrumental in changing the way we live our lives. Steve was one of the world’s true entrepreneurs – he created the Apple II, the iMac, iPod, iPhone and most recently, the iPad – five products that transformed the technological, music, film, TV, publishing and gaming industries.

Tributes have already been received from Bill Gates (Microsoft), Mark Zuckerberg (Mr. Facebook) and even Barrack Obama. Apple stores across the world have also received tributes to Steve and his incredible achievements.

Having battled for some seven years with pancreatic cancer, he passed away yesterday.

Read more about this at Apple

After much speculation, various rumours and delays, the new iPhone is finally with us – although I heard on the news that the counterfeit gangs in China have the iPhone 5!

As the name suggests, it is more of an evolutionary upgrade from the 4 rather than a brand new model.

However, Apple have made some rather nice improvements to do with performance and the built in camera.

Find out all about the new iPhone 4S at the Apple Website

Is it worth signing up with your mobile provider for 2 years to get one?

These are the main improvements:

• It has a Dual Core A5 processor so everything happens faster. You’ll also have less of a wait before you can get snap happy with the new camera.
• The camera will shoot 1080p (high definition) video; a first for a camera phone
• Resolution on the camera is up from 5MP to 8MP; so if the lens will cope you get better pictures. Do bear in mind that 5MP will already blow up to A3 for printing
• The camera sensor is illuminated and Apple claim it’s more sensitive
• There’s a five element lens that can shoot faster too plus a better flash

If the camera is as good as Apple say, then you might not need to take a compact camera with you so often…like you do now, don’t you?

For now I’ll struggle on with my trusty 3GS…although it’s speed, or lack thereof, can be a bit frustrating…

WHOIS Lookup

At the bottom of the right hand sidebar on every ‘blog’ page you’ll find the ‘WHOIS’ widget. Simply fill in the domain name you want to check up on, do some primary school maths and then click on ‘Check Domain’. Wait a few seconds until extra options occur. Click on the underlined ‘Domain WHOIS’ and you’ll get a nicely formatted page with lots of information about the domain.

External IP Address

Every connection to the internet has a unique number or ‘IP Address’. Sometimes it’s useful to know what it is – e.g. for support staff. At the bottom of our ‘Customer Support’ page is a single line display displaying your Internet IP Address.

Newsletter

For now, we’ve called our new newsletter ‘news@nomis’ and we’ll use it to send you useful information that will benefit you or your business. If there are security alerts on the internet, we’ll send you information about those too. Don’t worry, we won’t spam your inbox with useless information. You can manage your subscription using the ‘news@nomis’ link at the bottom of every web page.

If you have something interesting to submit, let us know and we might send that out too…

Most people are aware of the fact that companies such as Google, Facebook and Yahoo ‘tailor’ our experience on the internet according to our past excursions on the web. But is there more to it than that? Are we being ‘spoon fed’ what these companies want us to see based on our perceived status in life and where we live?

Or is it just another conspiracy theory?

Click on the following link and see what you think: TED’s View – it opens in a new page and is 9 minutes long.

I never got round to trying the original iPad, but on a recent holiday a friend’s iPad 2 was the only link we had with the real world – so I gave it a try. OK, so it’s just like a big iPhone when you first use it – that’s great isn’t it? You don’t have to learn a new device.

What I liked about it was that you could simply pick it up, flip open the cover and off you go – no waiting for Windows to boot up and apply numerous updates. We used it to check up and buy stuff on eBay, keep in touch with friends on Facebook, look at work e-mails and reply and look for places to go while we were away.

Most of the time however, it seemed to be playing a game involving ‘Zombies and Plants’ fighting each other – an obvious theme for a game…

When we got back to Blighty, I was in ‘rush out and buy an iPad 2′ mode but then a colleague stuck a spanner in the works – ‘I’d wait for the iPad 3, it’s much better’. Mmmm.

One thing is for sure, the iPad is brilliant for doing one-on-one presentations. Now Steve Jobs has left Apple, maybe I’ll be able to look at Adobe Flash websites too…

Why will I wait for an iPad 3?

Reading the various blogs on the web, there are lots of reasons to wait. But I reckon I’ll wait a bit longer – until after the buying frenzy when it’s released. It’ll give Apple the chance to fix all the bugs – remember the iPhone 4?

So what are the ‘alleged’ benefits:

• The screen resolution is going to be double that of the iPad 2 – great for games, photos and movies
• It will probably have a much faster processor – the Apple A6? – which is always good
• More storage for my stuff – I’ll fill it with books, music and movies for my 2012 holiday
• A better camera – with flash? – can’t see its teeny lens quite being up to my Canon EOS400 SLR though
• It could feature a ‘Near Field Communications’ chip so you can take over nearby Macs and use your settings and data at the flick of your wrist – I don’t have a Mac
• There could be a ‘Thunderbolt’ port – really fast graphics

What will the price be? Rumours suggest it could be either higher or lower – helpful!

So unless Apple are going to rush them out to fill our Christmas stockings…I’ll probably have to wait until early 2012…