You think your business has it rough? The people of Battlestar Galactica have lived through a recession you wouldn't believe. With dwindling resources, a skeleton crew, enemies constantly lurking out of view, and a pervasive threat of annihilation, Admiral Adama navigates the vast unknown. Like any leader, he makes his share of mistakes--sometimes with devastating consequences. But regardless of the fate of that ragtag fleet, the tale of Galactica is rife with lessons that can benefit any business leader.

1. Tech isn't always the answer.

In the premiere episode, the Cylons took out the entire human battle fleet by exploiting a weakness in the computer network. Only the Galactica survived, because its network was offline. The takeaway? Overdependence on technology can be your downfall.

Steve Ballmer is trash-talking Apple again. No surprise there, as Microsoft's famously loud-mouthed CEO has taken plenty of swings at Cupertino over the years, such as when he snickered at the iPhone back in 2007. Ballmer's most recent shot came Thursday at the McGraw-Hill Companies' Media Summit New York, where Ballmer was interviewed via webcast by BusinessWeek editor-in-chief Stephen Adler.

For this week's Casual Friday column, Richard Hatch of Battlestar Galactica went on to talk with us about a social network -- and dating site -- for nerds that he's working on with voice actor Dino Andrade. And, of course, about the end of series he's been attached to for 30 someodd-years. But today, as the season finale is set to air, we've come across a Frakking load of superfans online. Here are a couple of our favorites:

Apple's facing new legal action over data speeds on the iPhone 3G. A man from New Jersey says the company isn't living up to its promise of superfast surfing -- and now, he's demanding action. His lawsuit makes for more than half a dozen network-related complaints filed against Apple in America's courts.

Gmail may be the world's best Web-based mail service, but that doesn't mean it's perfect. It has one big drawback: You can't really customize it. That's where Better Gmail 2 comes in. This free Firefox add-in offers many kinds of customizations, including letting you decide whether and how to show "Blind CCs," what information the sidebar should display and leave out such as hiding the spam count, how to display your messages, and more.

Chasing massive profits, crooks have unleased a flood of rogue antivirus programs that attempt to fool or scare unsuspecting PC users into forking over cash for an app that does nothing worthwhile.

According to the Antiphishing Working Group, the number of fake security programs skyrocketed from average of around 2,500 per month to 9,287 in December. The group's latest report, covering the second half of 2008, says that while rogue AV has been around for years, it wasn't until the middle of last year that crooks starting turning the fake apps into a serious money-making machine.

Video games may not be recession-proof, but they're sporting some enviable economic kevlar. Gloomy economics notwithstanding, NPD Group's February 2009 game sales figures are coming up roses for Nintendo, Microsoft, and — that's right — even Sony.

Know the difference between 'identity theft' and 'identity fraud'? Don't feel bad if you don't. Even within the security industry, within the government, and within law enforcement, the terms are used interchangeably although they are in fact different.

Deciding what is defined as and counted as Identity fraud was the subject of a gathering of Identity fraud experts in Pleasanton, CA last month. Hosted by Javelin Strategy & Research, it was the second workshop for The Identity Theft Prevention and Identity Management Standards Panel (IDSP) sponsored the American National Standards Institute (ANSI). In attendance were representatives from Javelin, the Federal Trade Commission, the Department of Justice, the Department of Homeland Security, Kroll, Debix, Affinion, IDExperts, ID Analytics, Experian, Visa, and the non-profit ID Theft Resource Center.

Power users who migrate from Windows XP to Vista soon discover there's something missing. (Performance! Device compatibility! Insert your own joke here!) I'm talking about the Run command, which made it quick and easy to pull up, say, a Command prompt.

Vista banished Run from the Start menu, but you can easily bring it back. Here's how:

Sometimes after sending an e-mail, you immediately realize it was a mistake. You slap your forehead and pray the recipient confuses it for spam or just thinks you're off your meds. Google understands your pain, and has introduced an Undo Send feature to Gmail.

Turn Undo Send on in Gmail Labs under the Settings panel of your Google account. Undo Send is hidden somewhere near the bottom of the page. Once the feature is enabled, an Undo option appears after you've sent a message. You have five seconds to click it. Hit it in enough time and you're good to go. Miss the mark and your acid-laced diatribe about your boss will see the light of day.

If you believe a published report, AT&T is about to (finally) make good on its promise to offer a "pay-as-you-go" iPhone, sold without the usual requirement for a two-year service contact. Commitment phobia, however, comes at a high price.

Here are details of the rumored deal, supposed to become effective next week:

This is an exciting time for Web browsers. Google Chrome is now available in alpha for Linux, and I downloaded it for Ubuntu. Despite the fact that I was running it on my rather underpowered Dell Mini 9, it started in the blink of an eye. Additionally, any JavaScript-heavy sites like Gmail or Google Docs were so responsive that it's almost unbelievable.

Does that sound familiar? That's right. It's just like how Firefox used to be.