By Andrew Liszewski, Gizmodo – January 03, 2013 at 10:40AM
The next time you’re filling out your logs after a long shift on the Enterprise and need to pad it out, just hop on over to Riker Ipsum, which generates random text based on quotes from William Riker. Of course Picard was always far more quotable, but the mundane musings of the first officer make for much better filler. More » 
By (author unknown), Dilbert Daily Strip – January 03, 2013 at 01:00AM
By Noemi Twigg, ForeverGeek – January 02, 2013 at 06:00AM
If you are anything like me, you spent a huge chunk of the holiday break to get away from work and catch up on reading and watching TV series and movies. You may even have revisited franchises that hold a special place in your heart. If you’re a Trekkie – or simply someone who likes Star Trek – then you might have spent some quality time with your favorite characters in one way or another.
How about we add a little more joy to your life as we say “Hi!” to 2013?
Matt at ChartGeek obviously has a penchant for all things Star Trek, and he went out of his way to create a Star Trek character chart that will put a smile on your face.
This Star Trek character chart is not as comprehensive as hardcore Trekkies might want, but it does feature every Star Trek bridge officer from every show. And while we do love taking a look at Star Trek technology – who has not fantasized about actually being able to use a transporter or a tricorder? – the Star Trek character chart is fodder for trivia enthusiasts. At the very least, you can use it to make sure you win the Star Trek part of the next Geek Night.
Star Trek Character Chart
By Thorin Klosowski, Lifehacker – January 02, 2013 at 09:00AM
Your gadgets are important to you, and the last thing you want to happen is for them to get soaked in a surprise snow storm. While you can buy waterproof bags, DIY Photography shows off how you can do your own waterproofing of any canvas bag with a little wax.
The process itself is pretty easy. You need two pots, a mixture of paraffin and bee’s wax, and a brush. Boil a bit of water in one pot, then place the other pot inside it with the wax and wait for it to melt. Then coat the bag with the wax using the brush. Once you’re satisfied you covered the bag, let it dry, toss it into an old pillowcase, and then put it in the dryer for 15 minutes to 30 minutes. When it’s done, you’ll have a water resistant bag for a fraction of the price of buying one new. Head over to DIY Photography for the full guide, as well a few tips for converting that bag into a dedicated camera bag.
Spoil Your Camera With A DIY Waxed Camera Bag | DIY Photography
By noreply@blogger.com (John), Super Punch – January 01, 2013 at 05:28PM
Here’s instructions for building a Lego Tie Fighter designed by Jerac.
By Yaara Lancet, MakeUseOf – January 01, 2013 at 06:30PM
What comes to your mind when you hear the word Facebook? Maybe you’re thinking “social network” or “friends”, but for many users, Facebook also means two other things: frequent changes and privacy concerns. If there’s one thing we’ve learned about Facebook, is that they’re not really concerned about what we like or our privacy. Nor should they be. When it comes to privacy, it’s our responsibility as Facebook users to make sure we keep ourselves secure and safe while using Facebook.
As for the frequent changes, most of these are rather coolly accepted, and when we get right down to it, most new features and interface changes come to serve Facebook’s interests rather than the users’. The latest Facebook change is one shining exception: new Facebook privacy settings. Like I already said, taking care of privacy is our responsibility; it’s also in our best interest.
The new privacy settings turn Facebook’s complex security settings into something much more intelligible, so it’s easier than ever before to be responsible. Let’s take a look at everything that’s changed, and see exactly what you can and can’t do with it.
This is Facebook’s new privacy menu, and the most significant and important addition to Facebook privacy settings. The new menu makes several settings which you previously had to dig for much more accessible and easy to control. These settings are probably the most important for any Facebook user, and include such things as who can see your posts, who can contact you, etc.
As you can see, the wording was also improved, and sounds much more human now. Whereas before you had to half guess what a certain setting does, the new wording can’t be any clearer. “Who can see my stuff?” is where you control who sees your posts (this can be changed for an individual post when you write it), and quickly access the View As options and the new activity log which we’ll touch on in a minute.
The “Who can contact me?” is the new name to what was previously known as “Who can send you Facebook messages”. The new settings let you choose between two filters: basic and strict. The difference? In basic filtering, you’ll mostly get messages from your friends and friends of friends; in strict filtering, you’ll mostly get messages only from your friends. Notice the vague wording? It’s repeated again in the more detailed help page, and basically means that sometimes you might get messages from other people as well.
Note that regardless of the filter you choose, the messages you miss won’t be blocked, but simply go to your Other folder, and you won’t be notified about them. You can check this folder periodically to make sure you didn’t miss anything important.
One of the most useful features of the new menu is the ability to block someone in exactly 5 seconds. Is someone bothering you? Simply enter a name in the third part of the privacy menu, find the person, and click block. This won’t take you more than 10 seconds if you tried.
One last feature you should be aware of is the search option. Granted, the new menu won’t answer all your needs and questions, but you can perform searches straight from it and find answers and solutions to almost any other issue. Just click the magnifying glass icon on the top right corner and search for a term. The results will include all relevant Facebook help pages.
The old settings page was definitely usable. If you really cared about your privacy, you could dig into it and find all the settings you needed. But why did it have to be so hard? Well, it’s not anymore. When you access your settings now, you’ll find that the page has changed completely, with a new menu on the left, clearly defined items and a complete re-wording of most of the settings. Want to control which apps can access your profile? Click on “Apps” on the left and you’re there. Amazing!
While it does seem like there’s more to go through and read in your new settings, everything is much easier to understand, and it’s well worth your time to go through everything and make sure it’s all set to your liking. This is especially important if you haven’t done this in a while, due to the annoying complexity of the previous settings page.
The new activity log makes it very easy to see everything you’ve posted, everything you’re tagged in, etc., and it’s easily accessible from the new shortcut menu. The activity log is chronological – you can see exactly where you are on your timeline using the time indicator on the right – but you can also filter it using several other settings. All the filters are available on the left side, where you can choose to see only photos, likes or comments, only posts you’re tagged in, only posts in groups, and pretty much anything else you can think of. You can also easily access items you need to review, such as tags you need to authorize, etc. This makes it much easier to review your timeline, make sure nothing out of the order is posted about you and re-think things you’ve posted yourself.
![facebook-activity-log-filters[4]](https://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/facebook-activity-log-filters4.png)
Found a photo of yourself or a tag you don’t like? You can easily remove it right from the activity log, with one extra perk: you can now also ask for an entire photo to be removed completely, not just your own tag. So how do you do this?
![facebook-remove-tags[4]](https://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/facebook-remove-tags4.png)
If you find something inappropriate, you can either click on the sharing indicator and choose “Report/Remove Tag….”, or, if you find several items you want to take care of, select all of them and click on the blue “Report/Remove Tags” button that appears at the top of the page.
![facebook-remove-tags-1[4]](https://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/facebook-remove-tags-14.png)
Now you’ll get the option to remove your tags, which happens immediately, and also to request that the item be removed completely. Great for those post-party realizations.
One of the major changes Facebook is implementing will concern app permissions – an extremely important and often overlooked subject. While I couldn’t see this change implemented yet, it will be soon according to Facebook.
![facebook-app-permissions[4]](https://main.makeuseoflimited.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/facebook-app-permissions4.png)
When this rolls out, you’ll get fine-grained control over permissions you’re granting apps. Each request will appear in a separate window, and you’ll have the ability to grant some permissions while declining others. I hope to see this implemented by apps very soon.
Facebook’s privacy settings are no joke. If you choose to have a Facebook account and share information, it’s imperative that you know exactly who you’re sharing with. And this includes third-party apps to which you might have granted access. The new Facebook privacy settings are truly easy to understand and tweak, but there’s one thing they can’t do: change themselves.
You’ve seen above how simple these settings are now. It will take you all of 10 minutes to go through everything on the settings page and make sure all is in order. To make your life even easier, here’s a short list of things you should pay attention to:
These are, of course, only highlights, but if you do nothing else to protect your privacy, at least take a look at these settings.
What do you think of Facebook’s new privacy settings? Did they help you take control of your Facebook presence? Are there other important settings you think no one should skip? Share all your thoughts below.
Image Credit: key image via Shutterstock
The post Make Sure You’re Secure With Facebook’s New Privacy Settings – A Complete Guide appeared first on MakeUseOf.
By Lambert V., The Awesomer – January 01, 2013 at 11:00AM
In case some dumbass asks you to prove why the Earth is round – or says otherwise – here are 10 ways of proving it. Honestly by the time we got to the middle we forgot about the obvious number 1.
100% Middle-earth
If Earth Had Rings
Welcome to Earth
Earth from Space
Short Film: Round 6
By Lambert V., The Awesomer – December 31, 2012 at 06:00PM
(NSFW: Language) Capt. Picard gets stuck on a door, Geordi forgets his line and Worf can’t stop laughing in the gag reel from the 2nd season of Star Trek: The Next Generation. Season 1 reel here.
Star Trek: The Avian Factor
Star Trek TNG: Acid Drive
Low-Budget Star Trek
HISHE: Star Trek
Star Wars vs. Star Trek
By Sufyan bin Uzayr, noupe – December 31, 2012 at 11:44AM
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We have come to the end of 2012, and a new year is knocking or has already arrived in some areas of the world. High time for this article. Each year, hundreds of amazing free WordPress themes are released: the good, the bad and the ugly. Naturally, 2012 wasn’t an exception. WordPress lovers received numerous free themes for their blogs and websites. In this round-up, we enlist 50 awesome free themes for self-hosted WordPress sites.
By Alan Henry, Lifehacker – December 30, 2012 at 11:00AM
If you want to take your movies with you on the road, or just want to clean up those physical discs but keep your films and TV shows on your HTPC, you’ll need to rip them first. Thankfully, there are plenty of great utilities designed to make the process easy and give you files that are playable on any device you choose, whenever you choose to watch them. Here are five of the best, based on your nominations.
Earlier in the week we asked you to tell us which DVD ripping tool you thought was the best. You definitely responded, and many of you pointed out that you use a combination of these tools to get exactly the file, format, quality, or encoding you want. Here’s a look at the top five of your recommendations.
We’ve praised MakeMKV before for its ability to quickly and easily rip DVDs and Blu-ray discs to high quality MKV files with a single click. The app has been in beta for a long time (years, in fact), which is just as well, since the developers promise to start charging for Blu-ray ripping once the app leaves beta. The app’s strong suits are that it’s fast, super easy, and cross-platform (the Linux version is available in the forums.) Plus, the app preserves all of the source disc’s information, including tracks, chapters, HD audio, menus, and so on. The app is completely free.
Many of you noted DVDFab’s relatively recent move towards being Windows and OS X friendly and the fact that their stand-alone Blu-ray ripper is just as fast as their DVD ripper as more than enough reason for it to be the best. We agree—cross-platform support is a welcome addition, and we’d note that the app is frequently updated to cut through the copy protection on even the latest DVDs and Blu-ray discs (so make sure you’re only ripping discs you own, okay?) To boot, the price is right: the app is shareware, meaning most features are free, including decrypting and ripping to your hard drive. Many of you note that you use another app for compression and authoring, but many of you say they hey, storage is cheap, and the rips from DVDFab are easy, one-click, and work. The app is shareware, so you can download it for free but additional features will cost you anywhere from $45 to $60 depending on what you want.
Handbrake is our favorite video encoder for a reason: it’s simple, easy to use, easy to install, and offers a wealth of tweaking options to get the best possible file as a result. If you’re daunted by them, you don’t even have to use them—the app will compensate for you and pick some settings it thinks you’ll like based on your destination device. So many of you like Handbrake that many of you use it in conjunction with another app—you’ll let another app do the rip and crack the DRM on your discs, and then process the file through Handbrake for encoding. The app is fast, can make the most of multi-core processors to speed up the process, and is completely open source. Best of all, it’s completely free.
AnyDVD (which rips DVDs only) and AnyDVD HD (which supports Blu-rays and HD DVDs) both earned high praise from you for being well worth their entry prices, and getting frequent updates to get around the copy protection that disc publishers include that make it harder for you to rip your own movies and play them on the devices you choose. The app can handle unwanted DRM, remove region restrictions, disables forced subtitles or delays, and even plays nice with DVD authoring tools if you’re backing up your movies. You can try the app for free, but its features will cost you: AnyDVD is 49EUR ($65 USD) and AnyDVD HD is 79EUR ($105 USD).
It’s amazing how time flies. DVD Shrink halted development back in 2005, but it’s still one of your favorite decrypting, ripping, and compressing utility. For many of you, you still use it in conjunction with another app, but for a good number of you it’s still the go-to app to handle the job. It hasn’t been updated since 2005, which means its support for newer discs is spotty at best, but when it does work, it works well and results in nice, tidy, small files that are great for portability. In fact, some of you called it out specifically for its compression, which many newer apps haven’t been able to match. It’s also super-easy to use, and completely free—and, according to the developers and site moderators, always will be. If you love DVD Shrink, you’d also love Lifehacker’s own DVD Rip, developed by our own Adam Pash to work with DVD Shrink and make the ripping process as simple and painless as possible. That app is also free.
Now that you’ve seen the top five, it’s time to put them to a vote to determine the all-out winner.
What’s The Best DVD Ripping Tool?
An honorable mention this week goes out to DVD Decrypter, which missed the top five by a mere handful of nominations, but still was one of your most loved apps for ripping DVDs. The app has been around since 2005, and even though development was halted and the project shut down, mirrors like the one linked above carry on its legacy. As we mentioned earlier, a number of you use a combinations of the above, and many of you noted that you use DVD Decrypter in conjunction with another app for the best possible results.
Aside from that, most of you voted overwhelmingly for these five, and the nominees fell off pretty quickly afterward. Still, we know that a number of you have your own favorites that aren’t represented above. Let us know what they are—and more importantly, why you think your pick is better than the community favorites—in the discussions below.
Have something to say about one of the contenders? Want to make the case for your personal favorite, even if it wasn’t included in the list? Remember, the top five are based on your most popular nominations from the call for contenders thread from earlier in the week. Make your case for your favorite—or alternative—in the discussions below.
The Hive Five is based on reader nominations. As with most Hive Five posts, if your favorite was left out, it’s not because we hate it—it’s because it didn’t get the nominations required in the call for contenders post to make the top five. We understand it’s a bit of a popularity contest, but if you have a favorite, we want to hear about it. Have a suggestion for the Hive Five? Send us an email at tips+hivefive@lifehacker.com!