Live is goodOkay, so Live is old news now, but that doesn't mean that it isn't doing well. I mean bloody hell, everywhere I look with Windows now it is Live this, Live that and I am actually quite amazed at what Bill Gates is still managing to churn out in this new revolution of web and applications. He – or at least his webmasters – were also one of the many people to be hot on the heels of the Web 2.0 revolution by updating their websites as soon as possible with a slick and easy-to-navigate design, and I have to say that they have done an amazing job.

I want to use Live for most of the services I use on the internet at the moment except for the search engine. I don't want to use their search engine because that would mean leaving Google behind, even though Live is a more stylish version of Google and seems to be one of the few search engines that is just a search engine and is focused on supplying it's users with a search engine rather than a website with a search box on it. Although after saying that I have noticed that some websites, such as Yahoo! have now got their own sub-domains for the search feature, like this.

Did you know that Live now has it's own map search, whereby you can use road, aerial (satellite) and hybrid (satellite and road) to navigate around Earth? Using Microsft Virtual Earth to search the whole world. If you download the browser extension/application you can view some main cities, such as New York, in 3 dimensional view! I mean you can scroll around many of the landmark buildings! I was following something that I originally thought was a railway line (it was a yellow crosshatch line) from New York all the way to Washington, which seems to stop at the coastlines of America. Then I realised that it wasn't even part of the world at all, it has been superimposed onto the map to show were the borderlines of the American states are. Now doesn't that make me feel a little stupid and embarrassed?

You can even do Windows Live OneCare scans from the website without having to download anything, all you have to do is allow an ActiveX control to run and you are away. That is how easy it is for hackers to access your files through a website. Things like this can be helpful, but if they are used in the wrong way, or in the wrong hands they can be dreadfully harmful to your computer and your identity. All that you have to do is neglect to read what your browser says about the control and you think you can trust the site you are at, you allow it to run and bam, you are one of the many victims of identity theft.

Okay, well it isn't that easy, because you can just close the website/internet browser, or can you? I thought ActiveX could download and run applications too? So all it has to do is download and install a very small file that shouldn't even take a couple of seconds to download which then downloads bigger files, such as Trojan Horses and Keyloggers that in turn will lead to things such as identity theft and use of your credit card details/passwords/emails, the list goes on and on!