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The series of mega-hacks is continuing in China, with gigantic BBS community Tianya the latest in a series of high-profile hacking cases that has affected numerous internet services and revealed the passwords of millions of internet users.

The good — well, kinda good — news for Tianya users among the 4 million whose usernames and passwords were published online is that the data the hackers published is reportedly from a backup database made before 2009. Since an upgrade in 2010, Tianya has stored users passwords in an encrypted format, so anyone who has changed their password since 2009 shouldn’t have much to worry about (unless they still use the old username/password combination for other sites). Tianya currently has over 20 million registered users.

Of course, that raises a pretty obvious follow-up question: so Tianya’s password database wasn’t encrypted until 2010? Apparently at least some of them weren’t, with passwords stored in plain text in a database. In its statement about the hacking, Tianya says there are “historical reasons” for this, but declined to elaborate any further.

In any event, as if it wasn’t clear enough already, users of internet services in China should be very careful about the passwords they’re using. If you’re not sure whether your password is safe or not, we offer some tips to keeping your accounts and personal information secure at the end of this post.

“To me, closed isn’t anything that doesn’t have total freedom,” Laurs told me. “By that definition, Android is already closed.”

Laurs has some bold predictions for 2012. He believes Google will start to exert a tighter control over Android, restricting what kinds of apps are developed and what technologies they can use.

“You can’t blame a company for getting as much as power as it can get,” he said. “If I were Google, it’s what I would do.”

He calls the 30 percent cut of the revenue generated from apps paid out to Google a tax on developers. The cut is supposed to account for Google hosting the app, running it on the Android Marketplace, and handling the transaction. While that may be great for some smaller developers, he said larger players may not necessarily need all of those services, and could manage the apps on their own for a lower price.

Laurs said the 30 percent cut is an industry standard only because Apple, which runs a closed system, dictates it.

Laurs isn’t without his own biases. His company, GetJar, is an independent app store that in many ways competes with Android’s own marketplace. The company has worked hard just to ensure Android phones are able to download apps from sources outside of Android’s store, something a few of the wireless carriers have played along with.

But GetJar has seen significant traffic, having crossed 2 billion app downloads in August, and 100 million downloads a month.

Google, for its part, has always maintained that Android is an open system, and points to the number of varied vendors and developers that use the platform. The company, to its credit, has been able to draw a diverse mix of partners.

But Google’s reputation for openness isn’t without its question marks. Over the past year, the company has been battling allegations from Skyhook, a private provider of service that help phones locate their position, that it muscled it out of a partnership with Motorola. Google has denied any wrongdoing, and claimed Skyhook didn’t meet Android’s technical requirements.

On Wednesday, visual voicemail company YouMail complained that its app was completely pulled from Android Market because of a request from T-Mobile. YouMail later found out a version of its app was in fact unnecessarily hurting T-Mobile’s network, and after some tweaking, said it was coming back. But the company still took exception to Google pulling the app completely when only one carrier made the request.

The process may be gradual, but Laurs sees Google exerting more control. The acquisition of Motorola is another step, he said, adding the company could always threaten to give Motorola the latest version of Android to maintain control of its partners. Google has said it would treat Motorola the same as any other vendor partner.

Android’s dominance is poised to continue. Laurs said by next year, it should surpass Apple as the destination of choice for developers, adding that he expects a number of Android-exclusive apps to pop up.

If you haven’t heard of Pinterest, you will!

Last week while out to dinner on an “adult” date night (which consisted of a fabulous dinner and tickets to the Philharmonic Symphony) I was introduced to Pinterest. Yes I was supposed to be enjoying the fabulous symphony (which I was) but I was also learning about this incredible site with all my new favorite things. Although I am sure all of the other couples (albeit, they were at least twice my age) were probably discussing the next set of music to be played during the intermission, I was busy chatting it up with my friend (who might I mention, she and her husband were the only other two people who attended who were our age) and looking through all of her pins and boards on her Pinterest app.

Sally (who if you read my BMI blog, you would know is incredibly funny and full of entertainment) asked me “Have you discovered Pinterest yet?” “Um, NO!!! That sounds a bit scandalous. What is it?” All I could imagine was some crazy site that made fun of pin-up models, (don’t ask me why but I was focused on “pin” being like “pin-up”) something along the same line as “People of Wal-Mart.” This would be something Sally would suggest for me to check out. But to my amazement, it wasn’t.

What is Pinterest?

Pinterest is a virtual corkboard that lets you organize and share the things you like on the Internet. You can install a ‘Pin’ button on your browser so that whenever you’re browsing something you’d like to save, simply hit the button and a box will prompt you to label your pin. The next time you log into Pinterest, all of the beautiful things you saw online will be waiting there for you to look at.

The website is designed to be like many social media sites. You start with a profile and  instead of writing out status messages on your daily activities or emotions, you pin things you like to your boards. Each “pin” is categorized by you into a different board, providing a way to organize your profile.

Everything is image-based.  In fact, it is very similar to flipping through a magazine and just looking at the pictures. For me it is like having all of the best pictures taken out of Pottery Barn, Williams Sonoma and Martha Stewart and combined all in one place. And lucky for me it is not just things I have liked–like Facebook and Twitter, you “follow” people and you can see all of the great ideas and things they like and have shared.

The best part: there are more than just pictures. There are instructions and DIY details. Now instead of seeing some great centerpiece for my Thanksgiving table and wondering how I can create it, there are actually details on how it was made or ideas on how you could do it yourself.

In one week’s time, I’ve definitely become an addict. It really is a fantastic waste of time….but it is incredibly useful and deserves your attention!

It may sound a bit complicated, but it’s actually really fun. It has literally become a fabulous obsession.