Imagine a knock on the door after you have been on the Internet, blogging, and the next moment you are under arrest. Amnesty International launched a campaign in defence of Internet bloggers in many countries - including China, Tunisia and Iran who have been arrested for expressing views which have upset their governments.

But how have they been tracked down? It turns out that they have been turned in by major Internet providers such as Yahoo and Microsoft, who have supplied foreign governments with the information they need to pursue them.
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People routinely ask about my favorite software so, I’ve decided to gather all my top picks in one place to make every one’s life a little easier.

All of the software listed here is free for personal use, meaning:

1. Any of this software can be installed and used at absolutely no charge, forever. There is no nagging, spyware, or anything else nasty.
2. Because it’s totally free, sometimes there is very little support. You either figure out how to use it, or just get rid of it.

So, without further ado, here is the list categorized by type of application:
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Most people don’t know this, but Microsoft maintains a large library of additional templates and documents that open right up in the Office suite. There are templates for Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, OneNote and just about every other Microsoft application.

Here is a rather complete categorical listing of the available Microsoft templates. Enjoy!
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There is a new breed of online service providers all trying to gain position as the office document system of choice. Big players like Google and Microsoft have already announced their intentions, and small upstarts such as ThinkFree and Zoho have also thrown their hat in the ring.

I previously posted my review of Zoho.com so I won’t duplicate that work here. However, here is some information regarding other online services.
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Zoho.com is one of the most innovative Microsoft Office competitors I’ve seen. The only difference is, the entire suite of tools is FREE, and completely Web based.
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