Starting next week, Thom Holwerda will be beginning a seven week internship at a Netherlands-based translation firm, so he'll be cutting his OSNews efforts back, and the rest of the OSNews team is going to need to fill in. We've been talking forever about how we need to recruit new editors to freshen up the viewpoints here at OSNews, and I guess there's nothing like a crisis to force everybody to do what they should have done a long time ago. So if you think you have something to contribute to the OSNews effort, read on.

Yes, the day is finally drawing closer: the day Windows XP died. October 22, 2010 will be the final and definitive day for the venerable operating system, since OEMs will no longer be able to pre-load it on netbooks after that day. I might not make myself popular around here with this, but thank god, it's about time that pile of junk is taken behind the shed.

We don't get too many details when it comes to Google's Chrome OS, but this tiny little tidbit dug up by The Register is certainly quite interesting. It looks as if Google is working on implementing remote desktop-like functionality into Chrome OS so you can directly control applications running on other computers within the browser.

"The row between Google and Apple over the strict iPhone analytics information sharing policies, which Google and its AdMob subsidiary claim unfairly shuts them out of iPhone and iPad advertising in favor of Apple's iAd, may face antitrust scrutiny. According to the Financial Times, US regulators are looking into the situation, though it's not yet clear if a formal investigation will happen."

It's been a very long wait, but the release is finally here: Adobe has released Flash Player 10.1. Since Flash has come under increasing scrutiny, there's a lot at stake here for Adobe. This release is supposed to use far less resources while still being faster, more stable, and more secure. Update: No 64bit Flash player for now - on any platform. The Linux beta has been axed.

This is a problem I've been dealing with for a while now. I have a Lexmark printer which I've bought without checking for compatibility with Linux (I bought it when I was still using Windows), and as it turns out, this printer is not supported in Linux. I switched to Linux on my main desktop full-time late last year, so instead of to my desktop, I hooked this printer up to my bedroom Windows 7 media server/HTPC, and whenever I need to print, I just drop the file in question on this machine, and print form there. I need a better solution. Update: As it turns out, Lexmark has recently started releasing Linux drivers (good stuff). Still, the problem at hand stands, as there might still be other printers that suffer from the same problem.

"Today, we're announcing the completion of a new web indexing system called Caffeine. Caffeine provides 50 percent fresher results for web searches than our last index, and it's the largest collection of web content we've offered. Whether it's a news story, a blog or a forum post, you can now find links to relevant content much sooner after it is published than was possible ever before."

WebM support has been added to Firefox trunk. "Today I landed Firefox's WebM support on mozilla-central, our Firefox development branch. It should appear in nightly builds from tonight onwards. Firefox should build with WebM support without needing any extra changes to your build configuration, unless you're building on Win32, where you'll need to have MASM installed in order to compile libvpx's optimized assembly."

This was inevitable. AdMob founder and CEO Omar Hamoui has responded to Apple blocking AdMob from the iOS ecosystem. Unsurprisingly, Hamoui isn't particularly amused, claiming that not only is it bad for competition, it will also hurt developers and users alike.

While WWDC is underway, Microsoft's Macintosh Business Unit has announced that Microsoft Office for Mac 2011 will be available in 32bit only. Microsoft has not yet completed the transition to from Carbon to Cocoa since it has focussed on increasing compatibility between Office for Windows and Office for Mac, and since Carbon is only available in 32bit, Redmond doesn't really have a choice. While it won't affect users in any meaningful way (unless you use gigantic spreadsheets or something), it has some Mac users riled up.

"During both the keynote and a Windows Phone 7 session here at TechEd North America 2010, Microsoft showed off a subtly newer build of Windows Phone 7 that features a few visual changes over the builds we've seen not too long ago from Microsoft MIX and certainly its debut at Mobile World Congress 2010."

"It's the one major part of the PC that's still reminiscent of the PC's primordial, text-based beginnings, but the familiarly-clunky BIOS could soon be on its deathbed, according to MSI. The motherboard maker says it's now making a big shift towards point and click UEFI systems, and it's all going to kick off at the end of this year." FINALLY.

Hobbies. Where would the computer industry be without them? Arguably, there wouldn't be a computer industry had it not been for hobbyists in the first place. The ineffable need to scratch an itch does still percolate even in this closed down world of big mainstream technology from big companies opposed to the little guy innovating. OSNews asks, what are you working on? We want to hear from you about your hobby projects (technology related or otherwise) to get a sense of what the community is cooking up for love of it, rather than because you're paid to do so. Share and enjoy!