professional

Apple is rumored to be preparing for a spring release of Final Cut Studio 4, the latest version of its professional video-editing suite of applications for Macs. The rumor, from French Web site Hardmac, says the Final Cut Studio software should be announced in March or April of this year.

The rumor also states that the update may not be what many of Final Cut Studio's longtime professional users are hoping for. Earlier mentions of the new version of Final Cut Pro said the user interface would take a dramatic turn toward the pro-sumer level, echoing Apple's iMovie … Read more

As a way of saying thank you, Microsoft has launched a new awards program for standout users of its forums and technical sites.

The new program, dubbed the "Community Contributor Award," aims to distinguish users who have put extra effort into the company's online communities at MSDN, TechNet, and Microsoft Answers--three sites that are frequented by some 4 million active users.

According to the program's frequently asked questions section, the award can be given to just about anyone, including to those who have created new content for these sites, all the way to moderators who … Read more

The 404 Podcast has interviewed professional athletes before, but few are as young, or as inspiring, as today's guest, professional snowboarder Kevin Pearce. At only 22 years old, Kevin is already very accomplished, winning back-to-back Arctic Challenge titles in 2007 and 2008, in addition to being the first man to earn two Air & Style rings in one season.

Kevin sits down with The 404 Podcast to talk about his snowboarding history and an accident earlier this year that left him with a traumatic brain injury. Narrowly escaping death with the support of his friends and family, Kevin also tells us that his miraculous recovery wouldn't have been possible without the help of his brother Adam, who also joins us as Kevin's unofficial photographer in the studio.

Kevin's also here to show off his new line of headphones named after his seven-deep crew of snowboarders called "Frends." The group consists of Keir Dillon, Mason Aguirre, Danny Davis, Scotty Lago, Kevin, and Jack and Luke Mitrani, and the current lineup includes five different headphones that range from earbuds to large DJ style cans. In fact, Kevin actually wears a pair with pride on today's episode.

Finally, Kevin and his brother David are in New York to participate in this weekend's 2010 New York City Buddy Walk, a one-mile walk to benefit the National Down Syndrome Society and Down Syndrome Awareness Month in October. Kevin's already well on his way to raising $10,000 but needs your help to reach his goal, so head over to his donation page and give what you can!

Like a lot of job seekers, IT pros are using social media sites to network and market themselves. But many are concerned about content on their profiles hurting their job searches.

Among the IT professionals surveyed for Technisource's "August 2010 Social Media Use Report," 41 percent said they've used social media sites as part of their search for work. Out of those, 85 percent have mainly used LinkedIn. Further, 32 percent received a career opportunity through a social network, with most of those offers coming through LinkedIn.

Thirty-five percent of the people surveyed said most of … Read more

Canon finally announced a pair of entry-level (presumably) solid-state pro camcorders, which are probably meant to compete with models from Sony and Panasonic that have been out for a long time--and the Canon models won't be available until the first quarter of next year.

I say "probably compete" because without even ballpark pricing information, it's impossible to figure out where these models fit in the market, but I'm guessing somewhere in the $2,000 to $3,500 range. Following on the heels of Canon's equally tardy-to-market XF300 and XF305, the XF100 and XF105 are essentially compact single-chip versions of those three-chip models, albeit with a different lens and other sacrifices to size.

Here's how they compare with their more expensive siblings:… Read more

This week on the CNET Monitor hour, we're going pro. As in professional.

Take a look at our picks of the best monitors I've reviewed, intended for professional use. Remember the "I've reviewed" detail when considering commenting. Yes, unfortunately, I'm limited to the reality of this accursed Einsteinian universe, and cannot review every monitor released.

Pro monitors are sought after by graphic artists, thanks to their ability to display accurate colors, with low black levels, and wide viewing angles. They're also usually much more expensive than a normal monitor of the same size.… Read more

If Google Desktop isn't doing the trick for you, check out Copernic's Desktop Search Professional. The company just released an update to the program, which is aimed at small business and worker bees with an organizational bent. The latest version fixes a handful of bugs and adds high capacity indexing functionality. Other noteworthy features include the ability to search any file on your hard drive or network drive as well as save your most frequent searches. You can also export your list of results in an HTML file; select specific files and e-mail folders to index; control computer … Read more

Windows has built-in disk management tools, and they do a pretty good job, but many users turn to third-party software for more robust solutions. Easeus Partition Master Professional Edition combines three of the most essential disk management utilities in one easy-to-use package. Its Partition Manager performs all essential disk formatting and maintenance functions, but it does much more, such as extending NTFS disk partitions without rebooting. The Partition Recovery Wizard helps recover damaged partitions and lost, corrupted, or accidentally erased data, and the Disk & Partition Copy Wizard feature makes it easy to copy a partition or an entire disk … Read more

Serious eBay sellers often opt for special templates and other enhancements to make their listings more attractive. Listing Factory 2009 promises to create custom eBay listings with minimal user effort, but unfortunately, it did not deliver on its promises. This program is in fact one of the single worst pieces of software we've ever reviewed.

The program's interface looks nice enough, and a wizard feature promises to make the process of creating an eBay listing easy and intuitive. But right from the start, the program puked up error message after error message. The messages popped up as fast … Read more