The best utilities do a useful job, simply. They are nearly transparent; you barely know they are there. Quietly, elegantly, they push ahead of you as you work, making the load lighter. Fences, by Stardock, does its job just this way and is one of my favorite programs I use every day.

Last week I wrote about how Steam's outage killed my plans for an afternoon of gaming.  Today, Joystiq reports that Ubisoft's DRM authentication server went down under the strain of users looking to play and killed the weekend plans of countless gamers.

Over and over, users are reminded that legitimate purchasers of games are often punished by the very programs  they supported because of DRM gone amuck.

It isn't just games either, that are hurt when corporations treat their customers as the enemy.  This week my iPhone crashed.  I called into Apple and was told that I didn't have Apple Care, but I did. I even had the receipt.

Even as Steve Ballmer was talking up Cloud Computing today, I fell victim to it.  All I wanted to do was play a little Modern Warfare 2 to blow off a little steam.  Unfortunately, Steam seems to have been down all afternoon.  Their community sections says that they are down for maintenance...but should their janitorial services keep me from playing a game I "own"?

While I can't tell you (yet) about the coolest, biggest new Star Wars toy that is coming to the 2010 Toy Fair, I'm happy to show you the flying Millenium Falcon that will be hovering about your living room later this year!

Unlike last year's Star Trek flying toys (that didn't really fly) this one looks like it might be air worthy, using the same large fan that powers many 'copter toys.

Eye-Fi wireless SD cards for your camera are my favorites for all around use because they allow auto-upload to the web while I'm on the road. Google is selling the $70 version of the card for $50.  The catch is that the deal comes with a 200GB of storage online included in the price.  It is a good deal even if you don't want the subscription.  Sign up and then set the subscription to not renew.  You're still getting a bargain on the chip.   Note: this card doesn't handle RAW images...there is a new, more expensive pro version that does. But, if you're shooting jpgs this is a real bargain.

It is difficult to imagine where the Imation Pro WX Wireless USB Hard Drive fits into the competitive world of mass storage.  Priced too high, with limited functionality and hardware that looks like it was designed in the '90's, it is a product that will be of value to an extremely small subset of users.

Bioware's Dragon Age, an M-Rated title (so not to be played near or by kiddies), may have the greatest writing of any computer game I've ever played. It is the first non-book "page-turner-I-can't-put-it-down" title I've ever encountered - it even has a moral compass.

Last spring the people behind Planet 51 took me on a press trip to Madrid, Spain with other game critics to see the studio where Planet 51 (the movie and the game) was being developed.  Planet 51 is an unusual project in many respects...the movie and game were both being produced simultaneously, in house, by the same company.

With the holidays fast approaching James is taking to TV and Radio talking about games, gadgets, and gizmos that make great gifts.

Like many of legendary game designer Will Wright's universes before Spore, this one is being churned-out into a variety of titles some of which bear only glancing similarity to the original beyond the name. Rather than enriching the series, giving new dimension to an idea found in the original product, Spore Hero Arena cheapens the franchise.