TECH: AOLDIGITS a free local phone number that can go to voice mail?

Friday, October 6, 2006

http://www.aimphoneline.com/index.adp?promo=778972&page=welcomeAIM PHONELINE

A personal, local free phone number you can give out to anyone — complete with always-on voicemail!

**Begin Quote***

Why Do I Need Another Phone Number?

Everyone worries about giving out their home or mobile number. Now you can give out your AIM Digits instead.
How Does It Work?

AIM Digits are part of the FREE AIM® Phoneline service. AIM Phoneline gives you a free, local telephone number that comes with always-on voicemail, delivered right to your e-mail box. On top of that, when you’re online, it lets you screen and answer calls, using your PC microphone and speakers.* It’s a completely free Internet Phone Service.
How Do I Get My AIM Digits?

It’s easy. Just register for the free AIM Phoneline service.

**End Quote***

Huh. Free! Local! Hmmm?

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Posted by reinkefj

TECH: What is the value of social networks?

Thursday, October 5, 2006

http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/readwriteweb/~3/32293870/social_networking_silver_bullet.php

Social Networking: Time For A Silver Bullet

***Begin Quote***

Today, social networks are enormously popular. The benefits can be seen at the multiplier level – people mentor each other through the formation of communities; and they network and inspire each other by example and input. Social networks protect people from the vastness of cyberspace and offer tools to find each other, organize and share information, or just keep in touch with friends.

Social networking sites have proliferated in the span of the past year. While I don’t have actual numbers, Wiikipedia tells us that there are at least two hundred social networks, with scores of new ones appearing each day. While some of these services focus on teens, others target individual professionals and some aim at organizations like businesses and graduate schools.

***End Quote***

Interesting summary.

I’m not sure what the values are. To me, the value is very very murky. I’m just not sure  there is ANY value. Other than a yellow pages type place to befound.

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Posted by reinkefj

TECH: Vista ain’t immune to old problems

Thursday, October 5, 2006

I understand that the old w95 bug is back in vista. A forged packet basically asking the new stack about itself with its own address causes the meltdown of the ip stack. I love it. It was a problem in w95 and fixed. Vista brags it has a completely rewritten ip stack and “recoded” the old error.

IMHO to rewrite an ip stack from scratch and make the exact same error has a zero probability. SO being the old skeptic I am, I don’t believe that it’s been rewritten!

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Posted by reinkefj

TECH: Don’t deal with Lycos

Wednesday, October 4, 2006

… they are as hard to cancel as AOL!!

Please once they start billing your credit card you can’t get rid of them.

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Posted by reinkefj

TECH: EVERNOTE a free tool to capture “stuff” … free!

Wednesday, October 4, 2006

http://www.evernote.com

***Begin Quote***

easily capture, store and quickly access typed and handwritten memos, webpage excerpts, emails, phone messages, addresses, passwords, brainstorms, sketches, documents and more!

***End Quote***

Can’t beat the price and works neatly.

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Posted by reinkefj

TECH: What happens when a web service doesn’t get traction

Tuesday, October 3, 2006

http://www.i-neighbors.org/index.php

***Begin Quote***

The FREE service that connects you with your neighbors and government officials. Click here to join.

Discover I-Neighbors communities near you.
Enter a Postal or ZIP Code:
Or Browse:
U.S.A and Canada

Over 6200 neighborhoods use I-Neighbors to:
# Meet and communicate with neighbors
# Contact elected officials
# Vocalize local concerns
# Organize events

***End Quote***

The answer is not much! It just languishes. A potential good idea that went no where. Who’s paying for it?

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Posted by reinkefj

TECH: Sharewood Picnic #72 — Three maybes

Sunday, October 1, 2006

http://www.masternewmedia.org/new_media/new_media_tools/best_new_media_tools_of_the_week_20061001.htm

October 1, 2006

New Media Tools Of The Week: Sharewood Picnic 72

1. Rebtel http://www.rebtel.com/ is a VoIP service that allows you to call international numbers at $1.00 per week.

Nah, don’t call international!

2. iBloks http://www.ibloks.com/ is a service that enables you to edit your digital photos and mix music, videos, and games in 2D and 3D environments.

Nah, don’t do that.

3. Approver http://www.approver.com/ is a web-based service that allows you to share documents and ideas with friends and colleagues.

Maybe, That’s probably useful!

4. ZYB https://zyb.com/ is a online service that creates a backup of your mobile contacts and calendar and allows you to share them with whomever you want and manage your mobile.

Nah, doesn’t work with my phones.

5. iPrioritize http://www.iprioritize.com/ is a web-based service that lets you set up simple to-do lists to organize your tasks.

Nah, not free enough.

6. ImageSquash http://www.imagesquash.com/ is a web-based tool that allows you to upload images, resize them, and change their format.

Maybe, might be useful.

7. YouRep http://www.yourep.com/ is a site that allows upload, store and organize your photos.

Nah, too many photo sites already. And, now Kodak is saying you have to but one photo a year from them. Argh. Rules change.

8. SnipShot http://snipshot.com/ is a browser-based tool that enables you to edit big pictures (up to 10 MB, or 5000×5000 pixels).

Nah, no need.

9. PixSense http://beta.pixsense.com/main.ps is a web-based service that lets you share your photos and videos with your friends and family directly from your camera phone, from the web, via email or SMS.

Nah, no need.

10. Bloginfluence http://www.bloginfluence.net/en/ is a web service that enables you to check the popularity status of your website by providing traffic details and sites linking to it.

Maybe, Hmmm. I’d like to know some of that stuff. But, it might require more understanding than I have.

I love the weekly thought provoking from the Sharewood Picnic.

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Posted by reinkefj

TECH: A quick look at the new Google Reader (GoogRead 2.0)

Saturday, September 30, 2006

http://www.micropersuasion.com/2006/09/google_unveils_.html

Thursday, September 28, 2006
Google Unveils Big RSS Reader Upgrade

***Begin Quote***

Google today dropped a big update to its feed reader. They’re characterizing their RSS reader as “your inbox for the Web,” which I kinda like. One of the big new features is that each user now gets their own public page where they can share feed items. It’s similar to Bloglines’ clip blogs. Another feature is feed discovery tool.

***End Quote***

Now I’m not a bonafide guru with a big following, just a plodding injineer. I tried the google reader that everyone seems so hopped up about. I found two things that seem to need some fixin.

(1) It doesn’t suck up the entire blog. I pointed it at mine that has about 800 entries. [Nothing as erudite as yours, which I enjoy reading. I ramble about anything that piques my interest.] And the new Google Reader, as well as the old one, knocks off at about 564. Seems like an “interesting feature” fmpov. [I’m an old mainframe guy and I like to see control total balance.] If it doesn’t read it all, then how do we know it didn’t drop one in the middle. Smarter people than I may find this behavior explainable. I bet not many people checked.

(2) I have about 12 categories defined in WordPress for the various topics I ramble on about. It’s interesting that the new Google Reader things all posting belong to category #1. Now one would think that it would know about those things. Doesn’t matter much to me because I put the category in the beginning of every title. It would seem that a shiny new reader would know all about categories and translate them into tags automagically.

Just from a quick look, I’m not overly impressed with Google Reader 2.0.

(What’s wrong with giving things version numbers? It’s seems so “orderly” to me.)

BTW what do you do when there is not inet connectivity? I’m of mixed emotion about web based stuff. If you don’t have the net, all you have is a glorified game boy. I sort of like FEEDBLITZing RSS feeds into my email box so I have them offline to read. imho!

But thanks for an interesting blog.

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Posted by reinkefj

TECH: MIXROSOFT WORD exhibits a new behavior

Saturday, September 30, 2006

I’ve been doing my alumni ezine in Microsoft Word for several years. I write it in WORD. Then save it as a web page that I post on my site.

All of a sudden, in the last week or two, long urls in a table cell are no longer wrapping. They are shoving the table right edge to infinity.

Arghhh!

Manually going thru, putting a line break in the url, allows the page to resume the expected boundries.

Now the question is how did this change happen?

I don’t do automagic updates? So, did Microsoft slide a change in unbeknownst to me. I’m getting suspicious of the whole platform.

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Posted by reinkefj

TECH: FEEDBLITZ creates one email

Saturday, September 30, 2006

FEEDBLITZ allows you to turn an RSS feed into emails. Neat. One email per day. It’s a perfect way for me to capture my rantings. AND! My one Luddite friend using it can read all my meanderings from my blog in one email. Perfect.

Then, I explored what else can I do with it. I read two other blogs of people I know personally. They focus on quality; some stuff is quite profound. (I OTOH focus on stream of consciousness rambling; that is no focus at all; quality you can determine; certainly quantity; DIKW all jumbled together!) SO I feedbliz them. And, today, for the first time, I saw the flaw in my logic. The both produced something on the same day and FEEDBLITZ put them in the same email. ARGHHH!

I think I have a fix. GMail help me! I can use the + feature of a gmail address. FEEDBLITZ if it takes it will think they are unique addresses giving me one email per author per day. I’ll lose the complete look at my subscription list. But I could keep two addresses active and throw the merged one away. Hmmm?

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Posted by reinkefj

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