Useful Crap: The Best Software, Websites, Gadgets and Tech Info That You Don't Know About

The Latest Creative Idea Blog: The Sizzling Idea Blog

2010-09-01T20:34:00.005-04:00

You may have noticed that it's been awhile since I last posted to this blog. Well, the truth is that I just got a bit tired of writing about things that I wasn't passionate about. Don't get me wrong. I love technology. It's awesome and is the only reason that life is this easy these days.

However, I just couldn't seem to produce anymore cool content about tech.

So I've made a little switch in direction. I've begun to write about not just awesome technological advances. I'm not just introducing the latest freeware, web tools, and gadgets-- I'm now writing aboutevery creative idea that makes the world a better place in my new blog, The Sizzling Idea Blog: Hot Banana Peppers.

Actually, I wouldn't say that I'm writing about every creative idea. I'm not writing about huge products like iPhones or cars, despite the fact that they are interesting ideas that improve our lives. I'm writing about those little ideas that make the little things a bit better.

Think about reversible clothing or umbrella hats or instant ice. They are the creative ideas that don't get recognized everyday. And I'd like to recognize them.

I think this is truly something that I'm passionate about. I love creativity. Just love it.

So if you're interested, I invite you to take a look at The Sizzling Idea Blog.

If not, I understand. Creativity isn't for anyone.

"Get a Mac" Campaign Ends: What's in Apple's TV Advertising Future?

2010-05-23T18:21:00.010-04:00

"I'm a Mac. And I'm a PC." This award-winning line, voiced by Justin Long and John Hodgman, has become a symbol of Apple's surge in the computer market. We can all quickly identify these seven words as the starter for Apple's series of witty ads, each finding a different way to show the PC up. But unfortunately, today, Apple made it official that this campaign would be discontinued, removing the ads from their website.
However, with the success that Apple has found with TV advertising, I would expect a new line of spots to air in the very near future. But how will they retain the same effectiveness?

Keeping it Fresh

Obviously, Apple must be able to come up with strong new content. But that's not the big issue, especially with the team of brilliant minds working on their advertising.
These days, television has essentially lost its ability to persuade people to buy things. It's now more about showing people that a product exists, basically publicizing it. However, Apple has plenty of publicity so really, what they want to do with advertising, is maintain their brand.
In the "Get a Mac" spots, they were able to effectively portray Mac's brand as a cool, youthful product for the quirky, artistic consumer. They achieved this by fascinating, amusing, and amazing the viewers.
Now, how will Apple replicate the success of "Get a Mac" without duplicating the same idea? In other words, how will they project their brand again, in another clever way?

Which products?

Do they want to continue to advertise the Mac heavily, or do they want to focus on other products such as the iPad?
Also, part of keeping it fresh is to avoid over-promotion; if Apple were to heavily advertise each of their products, they would lose their novelty and intrigue, two key components in the campaigns.
Personally, I think that they need the TV to help promote the two products they have entered into the most competitive markets, the iPhone and the Mac, for smart-phones and computers respectively. The iPad is a relatively new product, but it's entered into the much smaller market of tablets, and has already gained huge publicity. I'm not saying that the iPhone and Mac haven't gotten their fair share of publicity, but what I'm saying is that they need even more.

Will they shift their resources?

TV advertising is gradually moving out of the picture, as online presence and public relations become the two big things. Being the innovative, cutting-edge company that they are, Apple can opt to change their focus a bit. I wouldn't doubt that they will continue to air TV ads but how many they will air, is one thing they have to consider.
Is it still a good idea to allocate as much resources as they are currently, to TV advertising, while the internet is just as good, if not a better tool for furthering their brand?

In the end, there really isn't a way to be sure of what the geniuses at Apple will do next. But hey, we can always try.

Even With Google TV: Why Broadcast Television Will Never Die

2010-05-20T19:19:00.009-04:00

It's been a long week and finally, Friday evening has arrived. Today, your boss yelled at you, you lost your wallet, and then, had to sit through two hours on the freeway during five o'clock rush hour. Basically, you just want to plop yourself onto the couch and relax, with a beer in one hand, and a burger in the other. Naturally, the first thing you do when you get home is to make a beeline for your beloved remote.
This a routine that pretty much any American can attest to going through on a frequent basis. For many of us, this is one of the main parts of life. If you ask me, it'll be pretty hard to change that.
However, Google has other plans, unveiling today, its newest innovation: Google TV. It is touted as something that will combine the best of both worlds, the internet and television. Its developers have promised that users will be able to utilize Google's elaborate search system to find their favorite online video content, then stream that on their televisions. Other nice bonuses include the ability to add favorites/bookmarks and surf the web.
Now, I'll admit, that does sound a lot better than Apple's faltering mega-creation, Apple TV. And of course, it is quite well-known that Google rarely fails to satisfy its demanding customers.
However, while I strongly believe that the internet will be the basis of everything in the very near future, I cannot see good ol' broadcast television ever fading completely from the picture.
I am well-aware that Google's wonderful search system can easily meet the highest of expectations. Still, when even after ten Venti Lattes, you're still exhausted and utterly brain-dead, the last thing you want to do is the "tedious" work of typing in a search query to find something to watch. Pressing the up arrow to surf channels is just that much easier. Frankly, it's a commonly known fact that us Westerners absolutely despise spending extra effort when there is any slightly easier alternative.
Also, there isn't a doubt that surfing channels is way more amusing. Many people adore the enthralling randomness of just trying to come across something watchable. It would be extremely difficult to replicate this feeling of randomness with Google TV, because even with some sort of "random content" feature, the scope of the web is so humongous that the likelihood of bumping into a good show would be next to zero.
And that is one of the tough-to-avoid downsides of Internet content. Humans are a race that lives for every bit of small satisfaction that they can get. And unearthing a good show out of your hundreds of channels is one of the most satisfying feelings in the world.
As an illustration, think about radio. Sure, music has higher sound quality, more customizability, and no ads on your iPod, but it's so much more thrilling hearing your favorite song on the radio, than it is choosing it on your iPod. Moreover, radio has a real sense of personality that isn't just whatever you want it to be; it actually has some life, some flare. Thus, I believe that within the decade, TV will be where radio is now. People will still enjoy it, but there will be many alternatives getting more and more attractive.
Still, even when it reaches the radio phase, TV might just be one thing that is indeed, "too big to fail".
But ponder this: What if marketing takes a turn and further de-emphasizes TV advertising? Then, TV stations simply won't be able to fend off bankruptcy, no matter how many people watch their shows.
I'll leave you with that thought.

Why Readers Hate Your Blog Widgets

2010-05-19T17:28:00.005-04:00

As an avid blogger, you probably dream about that day when you'll be able to make a living off your Google AdSense income. Every minute, you'll have a new visitor and you'll be able to declare your Google PageRank without squirming in embarassment.
Of course, in order to reach this level, you need a quality blog. That's a given. And to have a quality blog, naturally, it has to be awesomely useful and entertaining.
Then, you see the light, your savior. Blog widgets! Blog widgets can let readers check Facebook, check their horoscopes, send texts, see the forecast, and just about anything else that you could imagine being awesomely useful and entertaining.
Unfortunately, widgets don't lead to success, and it could even be argued that they actually detract from your blog's overall appeal.
So before you add a widget to your blog, think about these 3 things:

1. Is it relevant?

Now, it is true that your blog should be awesomely useful and entertaining. However, it is not true that your blog has to do everything anybody could ever ask for. Do you think that people need your blog to check the weather? There's the Weather Network, the iPhone weather app, and Yahoo! Weather. Your blog is the last place anyone would check for the five-day forecast.
One of the key principles in marketing is focus. Focus is essential to the success of any brand, and actually, the same goes for your blog. If you have a horoscope widget, a Pac-Man game widget, a slideshow of landscape photos, and a Time Magazine widget, people will be confused. What's your blog's purpose? But more importantly, what am I going to go to your blog for? For my blog, people will visit to find out about the latest in tech from the perspective of an average Joe. Therefore, I do not display the price of gas, dictionary or love calculator on my page.

2. Will people care?

Even if a widget is entirely relevant to your blog's material, you have to consider a question that people often like to hide from: Will people actually interact with this widget? I could have a widget for technology news on the sidebar of my blog, but I am well aware that nobody would care to use this. When people want news, they go to Time or Google News, not Useful Crap.

3. Load time

And finally, you have to bear in mind that any widget will add to your page's loading time. People hate waiting for a blog to load. If it begins to take too long or the process slows down their computer, it's possible that they'll just close the page before they read anything. Overcrowding a blog with widgets, however relevant and useful, will piss your readers off.

Now, if a widget passes all of these tests, then you can safely add it to your page. But before getting too excited about every one of the thousands of widgets in Widgetbox's gallery, think about how your readers feel.

Dear "Quit Facebook Day": The Privacy Policy Won't Lead to World Domination

2010-05-17T17:01:00.006-04:00

Similar to how Y2K didn't happen, 2012 isn't going to happen, and the Pittsburgh Pirates aren't going to win the World Series, Facebook will never take over the world. If it's alright with any fearful Facebookers out there, I'm going to put my money on Mark Zuckerberg not wanting to be the world's next supreme dictator.
With the recent uproar about Facebook's controversial privacy policy changes, people have started a "Quit Facebook Day" on May 31.
The group that started this movement has expressed concern over the "Open Graph" concept that Mark Zuckerberg has pioneered. Basically, this will allow Facebook, CNN, and 6 other sites to share the personal information of users, in order to adapt content, advertising, etc. to everyone's personal needs. Unless people think that Facebook wants to overthrow the government-- or for that matter, create a new super-awesome mind-control regime-- I don't see why this is problem. They're improving our user experience and showing the ads we would most likely click on and/or find useful.
Also, another concern is that more user information is being shared with the public, and not just your friends. My view on this is that if you're not OK with your profile picture and personal interests being shared with everyone, you shouldn't be posting them in the first place. If you feel that these pieces of information would embarass you if some people saw them, why would you post them?
All in all, unless you seriously think Facebook wants world domination, don't quit Facebook.

Why Facebook is the Next MySpace (aka Why Facebook is Going Down)

2010-05-16T10:46:00.004-04:00

Facebook rocks. Everyone talks about its convenience and social applications, while of course, everybody else has it. But it's going down. Wait. Does this remind you of something? Specifically, the last blue-and-white social network empire?
Back when Harry Potter was still the big thing, George Dubya's approval ratings were still high, and the New York Mets weren't a joke, MySpace rocked too. Everyone talked about its convenience and social uses, and more importantly, everybody else had it.
But boy, did it go down. At this point, Facebook trumps MySpace in users by more than two times.
Now, taking a step back here, does anyone remember why so many people began to shy away from MySpace? Personally, I recall things like bugs, slow wait times, unnecessary features, poor interface, and an overall drop in coolness. Facebook downed MySpace with a simple user interface, geared toward a new generation, that solely performed the age-old task of social networking (age-old because talking used to count as social networking).
However, now the site is error-infested, with new features/layouts that confuse us innocent Facebookers more and more, every day. And to boot, the fact that everyone is joining may be Facebook's downfall. When this happened to MySpace, it stopped being the outlet where rebellious youngsters could come and say, "I'm different. I have this social network and not that one." In other words, when mom and dad join Facebook, it stops being chic and it sure stops being fun.
Still, I'm not saying that Facebook will crash tomorrow. 400 million people can't decide that Facebook sucks, all at once. The fall of an entire empire is a long process. However, every trend stops being trendy after awhile (with the exception of the almighty Google).
But for all intents and purposes, Facebook rocks. For now.

Questioning the Utility of the iPhone and iPod Touch

2009-11-23T20:22:00.004-05:00

One of the main arguments most giddy teenagers use to convince parents to buy them an iPhone or iPod Touch is their actual utility for doing useful stuff (such as accessing Useful Crap (Oh my goodness, what a witty comment!)). Their irksome shrieking voices utter flawlessly planned lines that often breach these confines: "There are apps that'll help me do my homework," and "I can become more organized with calendars and stuff," and "I won't have to be on the computer all day to do stuff," and the always effective "BUT WHY!?!??!?!"
Of course, while it is impossible to combat the latter, you may have some luck using pure logic to clash with the other ones. But let me join their side (because after all, I am somebody who wants $300 crap that I'll probably never really use) for a second. It's true; you'll have to concede that there are apps out there that can help kids do their homework. There are study guides and question-and-answer apps and all the other stuff. There are many calendars and event organizers that can really be of great value. And in fact, it's quite possible that you will be able to re-claim the home computer as yours. This cannot be argued. You can even concede that the iPhone may be one of the most utile machines on the planet. I mean, it's got a phone and a camera and all those apps and a GPS; it's geektastical gold.
But that's not what the real question is. The real question is, how often are your kids actually going to use the goody-two-shoes features? Will they be reading up on the day's economic fluctuations or will they be reading up on the latest developments in the Paris Hilton saga? Will they be communicating ideas with friends about the American Revolutionary War or will they be communicating ideas with friends about the next big party? Will they be busy making an agenda or will they be busy popping touch-screen bubble wrap?
These are all questions that must be considered. Well actually, I'll just tell you the answer and save you the hassle. It's always the second answer. Simple as that. No matter how much they whine, "BUT DADDY!!! I WILLLLL!!!" they won't.
So come the holiday season, don't donate 300 bucks to Steve Jobs' plan to take over the world. You can get a workable MP3 player or even an iPod for $100, $150. Then hey, maybe you'll spend 20 bucks on getting them to remember what those obsolete books were all about.

Breaking News: Facebook Downed by Twitter in Number of Users, Bankruptcy Looming

2009-11-09T12:03:00.003-05:00

OK, I'm going to tell you right off the top, Twitter has nowhere near the number of users that Facebook has and it'll be a while before Facebook goes bankrupt but we can dream, can't we? Well the deal is, Facebook is the most popular social networking platform on the web and its reputation is expanding faster than Barack Obama's line-up of misguided, utopian legislation.
Everyone wants a Facebook account because everyone has a Facebook account. The most popular social network generally becomes the even more most popular social network because social networking is a narcissistic popularity device, or euphemistically, connecting with as many people as possible.
Becoming a fan of crunchy looking leaves is obviously an attempt to make yourself look like a joker. At the same time, becoming a fan of Michael Jackson is an obvious attempt to make yourself look cool. And posting your responses to surveys is an obvious attempt to make yourself look frisky and likable and witty.
But when a narcissistic popularity device ceases to function just like every single one will eventually, people stray away to the new big narcissistic popularity device. Think about it, MySpace lost to Facebook because of its complex and less-than-sleek features that made operating a MySpace account, way to hard. Now think about this: Isn't Facebook just following right in MySpace's footsteps?
Facebook started as a humble college social network then expanded to cater to the entire world. It's changed the homepage layout several times to "improve the efficiency". They've added little customization features to the status updates and they've even started giving us recommendations on who we should start talking to more. They've stolen every feature that Twitter made and added them to its interface. They continue to develop because they think it's quite productive; after all, it has gotten them into profitable status.
However, if anything, all this feature-loading is congesting the site and being counter-productive. When you type in "facebook.com", you don't see a nice, clean-looking page anymore; you see endless updates from every single friend and every single page you've subscribed to in the middle, each with profile pictures and other pictures and comments and "likes" and buttons prompting you to share these updates.
Then you've got more updates plus robotic suggestions and narcissism-extending requests and events and "pokes" on the side. It's gotten so bad that I'm just not looking at anything anymore. I've become a rebel and switched to Twitter.
Twiter barely has a feature and that's the best part. All you are expected to do is make updates on your status, maybe favorite a few tweets and participate in the number sign phenomenon. You're not obliged to check every photo that your friends have posted and watch all those boring ten minute videos. You don't have to bother joining fan clubs or sending people virtual gifts. There aren't applications. All you do is tweet. And that rocks.
Facebook is over-complicating itself and is failing to be that perfect way to inflict our self-centred comments on others. In fact, the internet as a whole is over-complicating itself. Who knows when Internet will be the outdated weirdo medium that radio and television are, and some other grand platform will take over the minds of our children? Who knows?

The Only Youtube FLV Video Converter that's Actually Working for Me

2009-11-02T18:29:00.003-05:00

My search for a way to download YouTube videos as keepsakes began in the heart of the Obama Presidential Campaign, during the Democratic National Convention. I'd heard some pretty damn inspiring words on those few few days and I thought it'd be nice to be able to have Bill Clinton, Michelle Obama and the one and only Barack Obama on my MP3 player (which sucks, by the way). So it started with the search query, "online youtube video converter" on Google, which led me to VideoConvertX.
This site worked great for the longest time and in fact, I was very satisfied. However, when I wanted to download Bill Clinton's big speech, I went through the usual process: paste the URL, input my email, wait for the conversion to finish (indicated by email). However, once I received this very convenient email notice and went to click on the link, suddenly, no download thing showed up. I tried it several times after that, but it continued to fail miserably.
Then, one of my friends advised me to try Vixy.net. It actually worked fine for a few conversions but then halted abruptly. And by the way, don't even bother trying to go to Vixy.net because the site has been taken down, although it remains at the top of most Google queries for video converters.
And after going through a bunch of sites that failed to meet my relatively loose requirements, I've found one that works. Yes. It's Convert For Me. It does what you want a video converter to do; it converts Youtube videos into several formats that you can save onto your computer or portable device.
And for those of you who skipped right to the URL, you missed a damn epic story.

Finally, An Alternative to Google Trends that Actually Works: Find the Web's Biggest Trends with Surchur

2009-11-01T15:16:00.004-05:00

I've always thought that somebody needs to make a site that summarizes the big things happening on the web at any given time. Google Trends is an attempt at this, albeit the fact that it is horrendous. Well, I think I've hit the jackpot with Surchur, the most comprehensive listing of the web's trends.
Surchur calls itself, "The dashboard to right now," and rightfully so. The operators of the site provide hourly updates to "The Realtime Board", a list that aesthetically shows what's hot. There are two lists on this board: Hot topics and Catching fire. Hot topics lists what's hot right now, while Catching fire lists what's rising quickly. Meanwhile, each listing is followed by a ranking of its popularity on Surchur itself, the blogosphere and Twitter in addition to where the listing is most popular (the feared Google Trends, Yahoo! Buzz, Twitter Trends, Technorati, Bing xRank or CNN Popular).
Also accessible is a "surch engine", which lists hot URLs from blogs, social networks, news sites, media sites and product listings. Users can influence these results by making comments or voting on how good the URL is. And at the bottom, Surchur conveniently shows all the top results from other big "web categorizers" such as Digg, Delicious, Google Blog Search and Newsvine.
Plus, all this is packaged in a clean, appealing template that makes everything neat and easy-to-read. So Surchur is the site and check it out, it might interest you.

The 5 Irrational Reasons Why You Want to See Michael Jackson's "This is It" in Theatres

2009-10-28T17:38:00.004-04:00

Going with the spirit of paying tribute to Michael Jackson, I'm going to tell you the real reasons why you're paying 9 bucks to see "This is It". You're probably thinking, "It's a good movie" or "I love Michael Jackson" and perhaps these reasons to apply to you. Unfortunately though, the vast majority of the 20 million people who will see "This is It" this week don't get to use those. It's sad but true. Here are the 5 real justifications:

5. You think it will help you become like MJ

This is a classic case of people feeling a need to satisfy their sub-concious fantasies of becoming rich, famous and loved. If these things are already part of your goals, you might think that watching "This is It" will make you informed and give you inspiration to "do great things".

4. You need to feel like you were a part of the tragedy

When something big happens during your lifetime, you want to feel like you were right in the centre of it. You want to feel like somebody who genuinely mourned his death and you want to feel involved in his great life and legacy. This is similar to the story of Barack Obama, the first African-American president in United States history. Everybody wanted a piece of campaign merchandise, whether a shirt or a bumper sticker, because they want to be identified as a part of the movement.

3. You want to have credit as a true fan

Half the people who never liked Michael Jackson's music suddenly started flooding into HMV to buy his CDs and memorabilia. This is because they want to be considered a real, die-hard Michael Jackson fan because that's just the "cool" thing right now. Seeing "This is It" in theatres is something I know people will be boasting for decades to come. They saw the tribute to the king of pop in theatres!

2. You want to feel like you're dong a good deed

It's true. When you go to a funeral of a person you never really knew or liked, one of the factors is that you can feel nice. After all, you're acknowledging and mourning somebody's death; what a nice thing to do! And even better, it's a famous person that everybody likes and maybe I'll even cry in between because that'll really show I care. But really, watching a movie isn't doing a good deed. No lies.

1. Because everybody else is

Ah, good old peer pressure. It's a contributor to virtually any decision we make. No less watching Michael Jackson rehearse for a concert. We need to be able to join in on the conversation at the bar or we think that watching a movie about a musician that some girl likes will give us a few points. I'm sure plenty of people will be scorning at those who didn't watch "This is It" just to feel that warmth inside that they did so they're cooler.

Why GM Will Never Overtake Toyota Unless They Start Making Hovercraft

2009-10-28T16:58:00.004-04:00

This is a little mock advertisement I put together to sort of illustrate what I talk about in this post. It's not very professional since it's on a 0-dollar budget but you get basically what it's supposed to get across:

General Motors was a humble little start-up in Flint, Michigan back in 1908. Not even founder William C. Durant could have predicted that it'd climb to such heights. Throughout the 20th century, it gained a reputation in the United States, as maybe the best practical car around. And even as the 21st century dawned, GM still held the lead in annual sales. Nobody could have predicted that it would have fallen this hard back in the glory days of the mid-1900s. However, since the late 80s, disaster had been knocking on the auto giant's door, and finally it grew big enough to shoot GM down.
But after filing for bankruptcy, the company is making an honest effort to re-gain its footing on the automobile market. Determined executives are calling it the "re-invention". But they are still refusing to look up to their Japanese counterparts, not willing to damage their sensitive ego. Let's face it though, GM will never get past Toyota ever again as long as cars are the prime mode of transportation. I think most average Americans have realized the Harvard executives at GM can't seem to grasp it.
However, I don't mean to convey that GM should admit defeat and just shut down. They don't even have to tangibly admit defeat. But they do have to stop trying to be number one and start trying to be number two.
I know that sounds odd to you. But look at the auto sector as a race on a sheet of ice. GM had been gliding along nicely as the leader for almost a century but then suddenly, it slipped and fell. So Toyota and a few other brands retained their pace and sped ahead. Once GM got back up, they were quite far from the lead position. On the other hand, now they're trying to run at full speed to try and catch up. That's not going to work though running to fast on ice is just going to make you fall again. GM just has to maintain a steady sustainable pace that won't make them fall down but allow them to remain a contender. Here's why.
If you took a poll of every American driver, and I'm sure plenty of agencies have already done so, it's most likely that a majority will consider Toyota the leader in fuel efficiency, value, environmental issues, service and practical performance. These are aspects that GM owned for the past few decades but has been taken away from them. However, GM is outraged over this fact and its inflated ego is telling it to try to snatch all these things back. But common sense and the marketing knowledge, that I know they have, is telling them to project themselves as something that Toyota is not, even the opposite. You're probably thinking, "Well, they can't say they damage the environment, are too expensive, are not fuel-efficient at all and make bad cars." I agree, they can't. But what else do analysts talk about and label Toyota when they continuously assert its excellence? They say that Japanese cars are this and Japanese cars are that. That's the key word, Japanese. But I'm not telling GM to start discriminating against the Japanese, I'm saying for them to advertise the fact that they're American and if you're a real American, you'll buy GM.
Now, I'll admit: A lot of people aren't about to buy a car that they think isn't very good just because they think it'll make them a better American. Then again, there are plenty of people who value this image of patriotism. A 4th generation American is going to be very upset if they feel any less American than anybody else; they'll but a GM. How about companies that want to seem genuinely American; they might use GMs for any transportation needs. These demographics aren't going to allow GM to re-gain top spot but they will allow GM to re-gain its status as a successful company. And research has shown that people prefer to buy from successful companies so who knows what will come of a simple step in the other direction?
Nobody can claim that they're more American than GM but there are plenty of companies who can claim that they make better cars. And maybe GM does make better cars but in the end, its about who the consumer thinks makes better cars.

All the Top News on One Simple Page: Most Emailed News

2009-09-02T11:03:00.004-04:00

Surfing around, sometimes when I see an intriguing ad, I'll click on it, and sometimes, it'll lead to something good. This time, I hit the jackpot. Most Emailed News (or the cheesily awesome way of doing it, Most Em@iled News) is a very simple website. In fact, there's really only one page on the entire site. It just compiles all of the most emailed news from the major sources, and puts them all into a less than beautiful but very effective list.
It's got the top 5 most emailed articles or videos from 17 different sources, including the likes of the New York Times, Time Magazine, Digg, BBC, Wired, USA Today and Youtube.
Now, you may be thinking to yourself, "Well, that's pretty useless." That's exactly what I thought when I first came across this. But soon enough, you'll realize that not only does this give you the most interesting and relevant news, but it saves you tons of time in contrast to you doing all this manually.
Well, there's not much else to say about Most Emailed News, it's simple, cool and very effective.

Get Invites to the Hottest New Sites with the Original Invite Exchange: Invite Share

2009-09-01T11:07:00.005-04:00

When a new and unique website or web service comes out, often, companies will not grant the general public access. Instead, they will employ the invite system, where new users are only allowed in when an existing user sends an invite to them. Unfortunately though, the original invites are generally sent to a list of famous people to raise hype, and so unless you have a circle of famous friends, you aren't going to get many invites very easily. You may be thinking, "Well, why in the world would any company want to do that?" Really, it's quite an effective strategy that is often used by Google to raise hype and test the service.
Still, it's an inconvenience to us humble users, but the good people at TechCrunch have found a way to jump this hurdle, with their new service Invite Share.
As suggested by the name, the concept of this site is simple; different people exchange invites to different sites for everyone's benefit. So when one user happens to get an invite to say, Google's GrandCentral, they can join and then send out invites to other members of Invite Share. And the more invites to GrandCentral he sends out, the higher priority he gets to have when he signs up for an invite to another site. What this means is that when he wants to get invited to a site through Invite Share, he'll "Add his name to the list". This puts his name somewhere on a list of users waiting on an invite, depending on your priority rating.
It seems useful and foolproof, doesn't it? The only problem with this site, as with many others, is the popularity. By this, I mean, there's too much popularity on the receiving end but not enough popularity on the sending end. The waiting lists for some sites get to 1000 users and by the time you get an invite, the service you're waiting for might even be released to the public. However, it's not hard to gain priority; if you've just gotten invited to a private service, throw a party, then, join Invite Share and your priority will skyrocket with every invite you send.
And bear in mind that over 100,000 invitations have already been sent and there are 54 sites you can sign up for, so you pretty much can't go wrong giving Invite Share a try.

Dear Steve Jobs, the Mac Will Never Overtake the PC and Here's Why

2009-08-31T10:57:00.004-04:00

Apple's Macintosh was touted as a revolution in computing because it boasted a graphical user interface. However, from the beginning, the Mac has been fighting an uphill battle likely due to a poor marketing strategy. But with Steve Jobs' arrival at Apple, the Mac has turned around and has regained some of its market share. It will never take over top spot though and here's why.

5. It just isn't that great

It's true. I know all the humorous Mac vs. PC commercials have gotten you thinking many bizarre things but the Mac just is not that good. You probably think that the Mac never crashes, it's good at handling photos and movies, it's got an easier-to-use interface and just about everything else. However, the PC has things to compete with virtually every aspect the Mac thinks its got going. iPhoto, Apple's ultimately awesome photo software has absolutely nothing on Google's Picasa and Windows Photo Gallery. And iMovie has nothing on Windows Movie Maker. That's not all though, there's tons of excellent freeware on the internet that only work on PC.

4. Abnormal

Most people have used a PC for a majority of their computing. They've gotten used to the simple and surprisingly convenient interface of the friendly PC. But then Mac comes along, decides to take away a button from the mouse, put a weird little bar of icons on the bottom of the screen and tweak just about every little thing the PC has done over the years. While Apple thinks it's being innovative and making everything cooler, consumers are just shaking their heads in confusion. And again, many software and computer games are incompatible for Mac because of its "innovation".

3. Impractical

Even most Applers admit that Microsoft Office is a much more effective system than Apple's iWork. The thing is that most people don't want to "create a beautiful document"; they want to create a professional document. So Office beats iWork; that basically wipes out students and business people as potential customers. And what does that leave? I mean, for most people, the prime use of a computer isn't just to play around creating little songs with GarageBand or fiddling with the cool features of iPhoto.

2. No reputation

When you see a guy holding a MacBook, you think "young, creative, eccentric", which might be good for an artist or an actor. And I'll admit, if you're an artist, a Mac will probably cater to your needs more effectively than a PC. However, a great majority of people want to get that professional look holding a smart HP laptop. And if you're trying to close a deal and invite a potential client into your office full of Macs, they're probably going to think, "This is pretty fishy, I don't know if I want to do business with this sort of an odd person."

1. Price

This is without doubt, the one thing that's hindering the Mac from having success. If I can get one of the average, sorta OK Macs for $1000 and I can get a PC with tons of storage, a bunch of RAM, a 20" monitor and a touch screen for just as much money, I'd probably opt for the PC. In addition, with the economic downturn, people aren't going to throw $1000 away at something just because it's cool. On the other hand, maybe these same people will buy a thousand-dollar PC because PCs don't have a reputation for being unreasonably expensive.

Top 5 Google Services That You Didn't Know About

2009-08-27T00:16:00.000-04:00

Following my list of the top Yahoo! services that nobody knew about, some readers asked me to do a similar thing for Google's services. Of course, Google has become the more prominent of the two so it was quite a bit harder selecting services that were both good and unknown from their repertoire. But with a bit of work, I've come up with the top 5 Google services that you didn't know about.

5. Knol

Google Knol has really not risen to prominence; it's just not a unique idea. Basically, users write "knols", instructional articles about any topic and anybody can read these. Still, it's a pretty good resource for how-to because generally, the articles are quite a bit more detailed and authors know more about the topics they write about.

4. Google Scholar

Google Scholar is good for anybody doing extensive research into a particular topic. Simply type in a search term, and it will return only a list of "scholarly" results, which include books and essays by notable authors. The only problem is that you have to pay to access most of the scholarly articles.

3. GOOG-411

GOOG-411 is one of the many services that Google doesn't make a penny offering. That's because it's a free phone directory of businesses around your area, very convenient if you're on the go and need to find a business without internet. Just dial the toll free number, 1-800-GOOG-411 (1-800-466-4411) and you will be prompted to say your location and the business type you want to reach (maybe "Toronto" and "book store"). After that, you'll hear a bunch of listings of book stores around your area.

2. Google Health

Google Health is a product that allows you to create your own health profile for you and your doctor to access when it's needed. Here, you can list everything related to your health, from medications to allergies to test results to insurance to immunizations. In addition, you can find doctors around your area and use other online health services as well. This is very useful for anyone who has any health problems at all.

1. Google Books

Google Books is an absolutely comprehensive database of essentially every book you'll ever want to read. But there's more to it than just the pure number; each book result is overflowing with details. There will of course be the number of pages, publishers, publishing date, author and reviews. But that's just half of it. Also included in many listings are a preview of what's inside, related books, popular passages from the book as well as links to where you can buy the full version.

Honorable Mention:

Google Transit

I couldn't include this in the main list because it can't really qualify as a complete service yet, but keep an eye on Google Transit. Basically, it uses the public transit maps of different cities or regions to generate routes for you to take to get to your destination. So you can see why this would be such a useful service. And it's expanding quickly as well; it already has the transit maps of numerous municipalities throughout the United States, Canada and Mexico. So soon, you'll even be using Google to help you find public transit. Neat, huh?

Useful Crap's YouTube Premier!

2009-08-26T17:07:00.002-04:00

Yes. It's finally here. Useful Crap, the tech blog for the rest of us has created a YouTube Video. It will truly show you why people who aren't geeks need technology too. But I won't explain to you, I'll let Gary the gangster do the talking!

Your Very Own Back-to-School Checklist: What to Buy Before School Starts

2009-08-25T18:46:00.000-04:00

I've seen lists on what you have to do before school starts and I've breezed through a few that list a few writing utencils but stop at that. But never have a come across a simple list of every single school supply you might possibly want to bring. This is what I've tried to create here:

Writing/Correction

Highlighters
Markers
Pencil crayons
Pencils
Pens
Permanent markers

Writing Accessories

Glue
Mechanical pencil refills/lead
Pencil sharpener
Scissors
Tape

Paper

Blank paper
Construction paper
Graph paper
Index cards
Lined paper
Notebooks
Post-it notes

Organization

(Portable) hole punchers
Adhesive labels
Backpack
Binder
Calendars/agendas
Dividers
File folders
Locker organizers
Lunchbags
Paper clips
Report covers
Staples

Electronics

Cell phones
Laptops
Printer/ink

Educational

Calculators
Dictionaries
Math set
Textbooks
Thesauruses

Other

Batteries
Bookmarks
Cardboard
Computer monitor wipes
Locks
New clothes
Paper weights
Sanitizer
Snacks
Tissue
USB sticks

Back-to-School Special: Top 7 Tips to Saving Money on School Supplies

2009-08-24T15:07:00.001-04:00

As the summer winds down, every parent needs to do some back to school shopping. However, budgets have definitely tightened with the economic crisis and now, more than ever, you have to worry about every dollar you spend, even on school necessities. Here are some tips on how to save money while doing back-to-school shopping.

7. Buy in bulk

While 40 pencils might cost you $2, 10 might cost you $1. Obviously, you're constantly trying to get the most stuff for each dollar. Hence, common sense would tell us to buy the 40. On the other hand, some people just think about the dollar amount and get uneasy when spending more. But think about it. Do you really think that your child (that clumsy little kid) will be able to hold onto 1 pencil for even a week, let alone a whole month? And besides, even if you don't need all 40 pencils to get through the year, you've still got next year...

6. Look for coupons

You may be skeptical that Staples or Target will be giving out coupons but get your hopes up because perhaps these two particular stores aren't giving anything. But trust me, there will be at least one store that will and when you miss that $10 discount, you can't say I didn't tell you. Anyway, the best coupon site around has to be RetailMeNot, which is loaded with good deals and has an excellent interface.

5. Don't buy what they don't need

Sure, it'd be nice to have a customizable stamp maker or a label printer or a pack of blue staples but there's not need to splurge on school supplies. Just buy the basics; pencils, pens, erasers, a glue stick, a ruler, a calculator. They don't need white-out or tape to carry with them to school or an electronic dictionary. You know they'll barely use any of these items.

4. Get them to use their old stuff

Maybe their binder has a few scratches and has a bit of dirt on it but get your child to use old stuff again. Pencils that haven't run out of lead and erasers that are only half-used can still be packed into a bag for next year.

3. Don't waste

You have to teach them not to waste anything that they have. Staples can't be used to draw a picture and you can't use full bristol board as scrap paper. Have a scrap paper bin and a few old things that they can play around with.

2. Compare prices

This can be done quickly with Google Product Search. Just type in what you want and it'll return the most relevant results with prices and retailers conveniently included. Also, you can organize the items by price, then go to the cheapest retailer for each thing.

1. Don't worry about brands

Maybe they'll want the best clothes, but hopefully, your child won't care about the brand of his pencil. And you won't be cheated in quality either; most school supplies are around the same, whether generic or "luxury".

Why Band Hero Will Rock Harder Than You Could Ever Imagine

2009-08-19T19:48:00.006-04:00

Many rockers are awaiting the arrival of the next instalment in the Guitar Hero Series, Guitar Hero 5, which is scheduled for launch this fall. However, feeding off its hype is a very different-natured game, which will also be launched this fall by Activision. The new title, Band Hero, is getting plenty of attention because of its appeal towards teen pop junkies, with a line-up of top-40 tracks. Here's exactly why Band Hero won't be that gimmicky little game the Guitar Hero super-fans are claiming it will be:

Pop is Popular

You can say what you want about how the top 40 songs are all badly formed techno garbage but the definition of top 40 is that they are more popular than not top 40 songs. Therefore, more people know these songs and like these songs. And one of the major holes in Guitar Hero was that, while everyone enjoyed the interactive gameplay, they would have appreciated a few songs they knew as part of the line-up. Band Hero will fill that hole.

Teen Audience

With teens, when something gets hot, it'll spread like wildfire. Just look at Hannah Montana and The Jonas Brothers. And there isn't much of a doubt that with pop sensations like Taylor Swift and Adam Levine headlining Band Hero, that the game will take off. I mean, look at 17 Again featuring Zac Efron; it's not like the movie was any good, it's just that it incorporated something that the younger generation already adored. The same concept will work with Band Hero.

Suited for Novices

It's more satisfying when you're getting 100% on expert than when you get booed off the stage for your lack of ability, even on easy. Hence, the novice crowd who don't actually play guitar or drums, will be able to enjoy the simpler sets of notes instead of desperately mashing buttons.
With this, Band Hero is touted as the family-friendly Guitar Hero, with it's "E-10+" ESRB rating. But I don't believe that for a second since most hits these days are ... inexplicably unappealing to the older generation.

Even Rockers Can't Resist

Maybe DJ Hero (which is also coming out in the fall, no jokes), is going a bit to far but even the Metallica lovers will probably just say, "Hey, what the heck? It's made by the guys at Guitar Hero so it can't be that bad." And how about them game collectors; there's nobody easier to get money from than a hardcore game collector.

With all this, I'm not saying Band Hero will actually be of good quality. I'm saying that it will be popular and everyone will buy it.

Find Ways to Stay Active When School Starts: Find Sports Now

2009-08-19T11:53:00.003-04:00

With America's obesity rate rising, somebody had an simple but excellent idea to solve a growing problem. FindSportsNow is the web's largest directory for recreational sporting activities throughout the United States.
People running sports can post the activities as advertisements or listings and those looking for them can find these activities. Listing is free and a good source of advertising so there's no reason users wouldn't want to post.
And for the people who want to get playing, the advantage is obvious. You don't have to spend hours doing Google searches just to find that everything you got wasn't in your city. Just select your state, city and look for the sport you want and you're all set. Listings provide you with the age group, gender, location, description, website, contact information as well as a few photos.
But if the sport you want isn't listed when you search, simply subscribe to the RSS feed for that sport and you'll be notified when a listing does come up. Definitely pretty convenient for if you don't have very much time.
However, the site may not be absolutely overloaded with listings right now, but with the digital age engulfing us, no longer will we use supermarket bulletin boards; instead, we'll be using FindSportsNow.

Online Lost and Found Listings at The Found Bin: Practical?

2009-08-18T18:34:00.005-04:00

Everyone loses things. Sometimes its just a pen and sometimes it's a laptop or a diamond ring. But imagine, if a few clicks could get you that item right back, for free. That's the aim of The Found Bin, the internet's largest lost and found directory.
After you sign up, The Found Bin enables you to search among thousands of listings of lost or found items and animals. You can search the directory by specifying the make, manufacturer, color, serial number and even location.
Or if you can't find it when you look at first, you can post the details about your item to increase the chances of re-uniting with it.
But is this idea really practical? I mean, what are the chances that the person who found your item happens to be part of the handful of users that The Found Bin has. And in addition, look yourselves in the mirror (that's right, I'm Canadian) and ask yourselves, is America really nice enough to return your item, especially if it's of value. Plus, does anyone want to spend time broadcasting what they've found for someone (who might just be fake) to claim? Not likely.
But this definitely earns an honorable mention for a good idea. Maybe one day, the world will become a peaceful, collaborative place where everyone will join a huge community of losing and finding and returning items. Maybe one day. But for now, an online lost an found may not work as well as planned.

Top 5 Yahoo! Services that You Didn't Know About

2009-08-17T11:53:00.006-04:00

By probably 2003 the world had gone through a major change in web tastes. Yahoo! had been the largest player in the search engine market for a number of years but by that time, Internet users had totally shifted their eyes to Google. And Google has been enjoying unprecedented success with a business model that is defined by simplicity and innovation. No longer would Yahoo!, MSN and AOL's model based on the sheer number of services, be effective.
However, the sheer numbers still are very important and Yahoo! shows us that just because it has way too many, doesn't mean it doesn't have quite a few good ones. Of course, everyone knows that Yahoo! has many great services; there's Yahoo! Answers, Fantasy Sports, Delicious, Flickr, Finance, Calendar, Mail and Search. These pages are legitimately better than most or all of their competitors.
But there are several notable services that linger in obscurity and do not enjoy the same popularity. Not many people will even have a clue that these existed, but they do, and they're quite good too.

5. Yahoo! Food

Yahoo! Food is a part of "Shine", a service mainly targeting women. But really, Yahoo! Food is good for anyone who enjoys food, especially the amateur (and maybe even professional) chefs. This service offers plenty of good recipes as well as videos regarding the tasty subject and a few articles as well. Overall, Yahoo! Food has to rank as one of the better guides on the web.

4. Yahoo! Entertainment

Yahoo! Entertainment encompasses Music, Movies, TV and "omg!" (a gossip site). And what can I say; this has to be the best all-in-one guide to entertainment out there. For Music, you get you're radio, Top 100 Charts and some news too. For Movies, you get reviews, summaries, gossip and more news. For TV, there's the must-watch shows, reviews, TV guides and a bit more news. Omg! is well, pure gossip. Maybe just all the normal stuff but when its all combined into one site and added to by the skillful developers on Yahoo!'s team, the final product is that much better.

3. Yahoo! Autos

If you're buying a new car or just have a love for vehicles, this is the site to go to. Spotlighted by strong new and used car search engines, Yahoo! Autos also includes an in-depth research guide to buying a new vehicle, useful finance tips and calculators as well as a guide to car maintenance.

2. Yahoo! Real Estate

Yahoo! Real Estate has everything you need for purchasing a new home. They can help you buy a home or sell a home, with finance guides, home listings, information on the best neighbourhoods to live in and a few specific guides too.

1. Yahoo! Local

Yahoo! Local is basically a guide to everything situated around you. This service lists literally every business, service or event that you want to find. Whether it's a barber, a mechanic or a restaurant, Yahoo! Local can find the ones nearest to you, complete with reviews and contact information. Of course, every listing is categorized neatly for easy search.

Why Everyone Loves to Hack Websites and Software (But Mostly Google)

2009-08-16T19:28:00.003-04:00

Let's face it, everybody's wanted to hack a website at one point in their life. Being able to take advantage of a page's flaws just seems so awesome. I mean, wouldn't it feel good to be able to hack such a huge site such as Google. But this isn't some random coincidence that everyone wants to hack; it's psychology.
Hacking seems extremely cool because you are able to feel like you're in control and you've triumphed and have the upper hand. This is especially true during an economic crisis where everyone's only experiencing loss and loss and loss. And this rule even works if what you've just pulled off was just a little trick that doesn't actually do much.
But also, it's a lot like get-rich-quick schemes (or what I like to call online jobs); you have this little feeling in your heart that this might just result in something absolutely incredible that will change your life. Of course, usually, this doesn't happen but easy routes to success never grow old.
And this isn't just some hunch that I have. It's backed up by solid numbers: On the trusty Google Trends (which displays traffic for major search terms in the Google system), lists the term "hack google" with more search traffic than "Mississauga", the sixth largest city in Canada. But here's an interesting stat; 8 of the top 10 countries in searching for "hack google" are part of Asia, with Indonesia taking top spot. This translates to English being a mere fourth in the languages that "hack google" is searched in.
Now, site owners are relatively smart ;) and they've really exploited the fact that people love to hack. People are labelling virtually every tiny little manipulation as a "hack", this Blogger-related site being a testament.
So people, stop hacking!

Why Twitter is Better than Facebook: How the New Kid is Beating Facebook in Social Networking

2009-08-15T15:37:00.000-04:00

The old MySpace and the barely considered Friendster and Hi5 all loom in the background as Facebook takes the spotlight in the social network hierarchy. And for at least another 5 years, the web giant, currently valued at over $6 billion isn't about to take a supporting role (but it seems very ready to take a pay cut).
Still, there is a pesky new kid on the block; but by no means is it a scrawny little midget. Twitter is the real deal and the bright blue birds are making a charge for supremacy (I wish I could say the same about those Toronto Blue Jays). And one day, I believe, Twitter will be the dominating force; here's why:

Simplicity

Every day, people are getting more and more picky about where they waste their time. And the economic crisis doesn't help much either. This is where Facebook's support of videos, photos, notes, apps and everything I haven't yet listed might come back to bite it. Facebook's got a whole bunch of things you constantly have to keep up with while on Twitter, you're not an outlier if you only update your tweets.

Addictiveness

Now, it's really tough to explain this phenomenon but if you do try it, Twitter is much more addictive. One major factor, I think, is its simplicity. But another thing is that on Twitter, you want to post anything creative that you're thinking at any given time while on Facebook, you try to connect over little games and comment on each other's photos. And especially with the mobile age dawning, Twitter's model is a better long-term plan.

Personalization

Last but definitely not least, Twitter is more personalized than its counterpart. Facebook prompts you for a little passive bio and maybe a few "What are you doings?". On the contrary, Twitter's model is based on any thoughts, not just what you're doing; this includes insights, interesting quotes, jokes, anythings. Of course, you can do this all on Facebook too but Twitter is more friendly towards random thoughts.
In addition, on Facebook, you have friends ... well, just to raise your friend count (500 friends guarantees you a spot in the Hall of Fame). However, with Twitter, you only start following somebody, either if you actually know them or if you're truly interested in what they say.

These three important aspects are the things that will give Twitter a slight edge over Facebook.

P.S. I just got Twitter so last I checked, I had 1 follower. You can follow me at: www.twitter.com/jerryzhang222.

Why Facebook Will Never Turn a Profit

2009-08-13T12:02:00.004-04:00

Facebook started out roughly five years ago as a social networking site for college kids. Then it expanded to high schools. Now, it's open for everyone, nearly everywhere to join. Today, it has well over 250 million users, using the network in 50 different languages for many different purposes.
Facebook is universally considered a good site, if not one of the best on the Internet. Still, after turning five years old a month ago, Facebook still has never turned a profit. Don't get me wrong, revenues are soaring; Mark Zuckerberg, the genius behind Facebook, projected that earnings would rise 70% this year. On the other hand, the cost of running a social network is not small either. The talent that Facebook must attract, the development it must constantly undergo and the fact that they have to store every photo, video, note and action from every user, even after they delete their account, all contribute to unyielding costs.
They've tried many different advertising models, each to no avail and the number of experiments going on right now is innumerable.
The general problem is that whenever they make an attempt to introduce new advertising, users revolt and create groups that run somewhere along the lines of "I Hate the New Facebook!" or "I Will Not Pay to Use Facebook". And if you don't have users on your side, advertisers sure as heck aren't going to want to give you their money either.
In addition, the developers of this site have made it so lovely and convenient and useful and awesome that barely anyone even focuses on the few ads on the side. And for good reason too; the ads that are normally scattered around the network include mostly the likes of, "I need a man: Install the Zoosk application and meet girls like me!", "Start a Mafia Family" and "Cariacature yourself!". Obviously, these don't cater to the great majority of the population in the world with an IQ over 1.24.
Oh, but what if they reduce costs? Then, there's the same problem, user dissatisfaction. Facebookers are very demanding people; they've been spoiled to an incurable extent. As soon as they even feel like something's worse off than it was before (which basically means any change to the site), the temper tantrums start flooding in. Of course, regular improvements are part of the appetites of the pickiest as well (so basically, you have to improve the site, without changing it...).
All in all, unless they start charging us to use the site, Facebook will collapse just like its rivals.

How To Be as Likable and Charismatic as Barack Obama

2009-08-13T11:28:00.003-04:00

This is a really simple process to making yourself just as president-like as Barack Obama. I guarantee you that this will change your life for the better. This is the one rule that Dale Carnegie forgot when he was writing his book (maybe because Obama wasn't born yet).
Trust me, you really, really need this.
OK, fine. Maybe getting custom Obama-rized image of yourself isn't exactly going to help you succeed in life (or maybe it is, who knows?), but still, it will change your life for the better... if only slightly.
So you remember the amazingly designed Obama posters that featured a close-up of his face- with a look of hope- plastered in red, beige and blue. Well now, you can have your own personalized version of the Obama poster with your face in place of the president's (that's right, you get to replace Obama!). Just head over to Obamicon.me, scroll down, and click the huge "Get Started" button for your amazing transformation. From there, you can select from 5 different themes, the Obama theme, the Free Iran theme and a few others.
If you pick one of the first two, you can either choose to use a photo, or take a picture with your webcam (I recommend the webcam). After that, enter the text you want to have on the bottom (Hope, Change, Progress, or just enter your own). You can also adjust the balance of colours meaning that you can select the amount of blue, red and beige that fills your face. Finally, just click the "Take Snapshot" button, and you'll have to do a quick registration at their website and you'll be able to retrieve your snapshot soon after.
So Obama's incredible secrets have finally been revealed. Have a better life, with Obamaicon.me.

Why You Can't Get Paid For Blogging: The "Pay-Per-Post" System Explained

2009-07-24T15:44:00.003-04:00

After disappointing results with the pay-per-click system, I started searching for a more surefire way to make a few cents blogging. That's when I came across PayPerPost, the site that claims to pay its army of bloggers to make posts on behalf of advertisers.
Now, this might sound like the first paragraph to one of my posts that would recommend a site, software or item to you. However, it's quite the contrary. It's just a euphemistic introduction to a post that will delve into the flawed paid-to-blog system.
Pay-Per-Post claims to have fooled 265,000 innocent bloggers into joining their forces. Let's hope that you don't become one of the disappointed people crawling out of their ranks. On the other hand, I am not going to apply the label of "total scam" on this site because Izea, the parent company seems like a bunch of good people have apparently made ads for a few big companies. Still, I will apply the label of "unsatisfying waste of time" and this is why.
To begin with, considering blogging your job takes the joy out of it; and as I've said before you can't create a successful blog without liking it. If you blog for pay, you make it a duty and therefore enforce pressure on yourself to keep doing it. Plus, the topics you'll start writing on will become forced and who likes raving about a brand of chocolate cake that tastes like cement?
And trust me, readers can tell when you're being forced to make a post; first of all, because of the fact that you have to announce that it is a sponsored post and second because you'll lose all your personality in any paid-for post. You may be thinking, "Well, they'll still like to read my blog." But the truth is, that nobody likes to read something that is a blatant attempt to sell something, which the writer is getting cash out of no matter how useful or charming. Thus, you might be seeing your readership tumbling rapidly after you start writing fake posts.
Also, there are strict guidelines that regulate your sponsored posts once you join and if you don't follow, you don't get paid. These include mandatory photos, average tacks, Google ranks, Technorati ranks, Alexa ranks, regions, blog hosts and more.
But even when you do loyally abide by these rules, you'll probably never get paid more than a few dimes for each post, that is if you get paid at all.
And if you were to take a look at PayPerPost's website, you'll quickly realize that it follows virtually all the rule of a spam site. The cheesy graphics, the made-up testimonials, the brilliant colours, the fake photos of users etc. etc. etc.
But not only does this apply to PayPerPost, this applies to pretty much all paid-to-blog sites. And for that matter, it applies to pretty much all work-at-home sites.

Comparing America's Top 2 News Magazines: Time and Newsweek Broken Down

2009-07-23T13:14:00.006-04:00

These two covers, both taken from the same week, tell a whole lot about this battle.

Time Magazine, the often quoted, well-respected news magazine that just about every businessperson reads. And Newsweek, the not-so-often quoted, not-so-respected, often forgotten, but still considerably well-read news magazine. In this sort of a battle, we almost always, automatically say that Time is quite a bit better than Newsweek. However, don't be so quick; Useful Crap has formulated 7 criteria to evaluate the quality of news of these two prominent United States magazines. This means that how well-designed the magazine is, how good the paper feels, how cluttered the site is, how appealing the logo is and how affordable the subscription is, don't count towards determining who's better in this examination. So let's get started:

1. Conciseness

While Time's articles extend on and on and on, Newsweek's rarely exceed two pages. You may say that detail is a good thing but sometimes, you simply want to get to the point and I often find myself taking a peak at how many pages are left to read in some of Time's articles while I know Newsweek can pack quite a bit into the few paragraphs that are used. In addition, Time has a habit of burying the lead; in other words, making people wait to find the main point while Newsweek is much more succinct. So if conciseness is the game then Newsweek takes the cake.

Time: 0 Newsweek: 1

A somewhat surprising start; let's see if Newsweek will hold on.

2. The Intrigue Factor

There isn't much of a question of who wins in this battle. Although Newsweek makes a decent case for itself with a few small special reports, a new "Conventional Wisdom" poll and a highlight on opinion-based pieces, Time easily triumphs. The latter produces plenty of lengthy specials all pleasantly titled as well as articles that are more fascinating in the nature of the topic (who doesn't want to read about Bush and Cheney's last days?) and the always entertaining Best and Worst Lists

Time: 1 Newsweek: 1

One of these magazines will really make a run for it now. Let's see which one.

3. Importance of News

Ah, what else can be faulted of Newsweek but it's notorious track record of reporting more on insignificant side-news than anything else. These days, while Time spits out articles regarding stem cells and Obama's health care plan, Newsweek is lulling on why Britney Spears is good for you. So what can I say, when you're closely affiliated with CNN, the most trusted name in news (as Time Magazine is), who can fault you one what you cover?

Time: 2 Newsweek: 1

Hey, don't rule good ol' Newsweek out yet.

4. Range/Variety

This has to be the most obvious one. One glance at the link bars on the top of both Time and Newsweek's websites and you'll see what you need to know. Time has sections regarding the U.S., World, Politics, Biz and Tech, Health and Science, Entertainment, Travel as well as People. On the other hand, Newsweek shies in comparison, with only the first five. But that's not the whole story. Newsweek essentially limits itself to those five topics while just peering at Time's homepage will show you that right beside each other are three articles: "Puppies Behind Bars", "Apollo 11's Next Giant Leap", and "Asia's Easy Money Bubble Fueling New Bubbles".

Time: 3 Newsweek: 1

Just like its parent company's (The Washington Post) neighbourhood baseball team, Newsweek is losing again.

5. Quality of Journalism

Despite Time's massive workforce that pumps out the most-read articles day after day, you have to give credit to Newsweek for its efforts. With a smaller workforce, Newsweek actually has recruited some of the better journalists who are dwelling in the shadows. If you actually decide to tune into Newsweek for a little while, you'll probably find their more opinion-based articles a lot more stimulating and entertaining, even if they concern generally petty subjects. Time's articles are packed with hard facts that are tough to remember but Newsweek might actually be fun to read. Not to mention the conciseness.

Time: 3 Newsweek: 2

6. Graphics

This is really tough one; but the final question that it came down to was: "Do photos truly contribute to the insights of the actual article?" And I say, no. Time Magazine not only includes good articles but some of the best photos out there as well. They make news beautiful. But of course, that doesn't count. Time does come out with cool graphics and this might be controversial, but I think that Newsweek wins this battle. "News/Week" a bar at the bottom of every Newsweek page is one of the most useful and innovative things I've seen on a website. It's quite simple but very effective, highlighting the most important articles in every section for every day in a convenient interface. Many other little things put Newsweek ahead in this department as well.

Time: 3 Newsweek: 3

7. Depth

So it all boils down to this. The depth. But there's really no contest here, unfortunately. While Newsweek is concise and easy-to-read, Time is a lot more in-depth. Simply compare the number of special reports and you'll see. Compare the number of videos, the number of photos, the number of pages in each article. And you'll see how much more detail-oriented Time is.

Time: 4 Newsweek: 3

So it was a good battle, but in the end, the victor was the more popular and more powerful, Time Magazine. Even after its complete re-invention, Newsweek falls short in a number of key categories. Time has brute force on its side with the amount of money it is able to spend on its quality. Newsweek doesn't have this privelege. And CNN is a good asset as well while the general mission of Time Magazine seems to be quite a bit better.
Still, they are both insightful news magazines and it may even take other factors to decide on your preference.

Subscribe to All of Your Favorite RSS Feeds- By Email: Feed My Inbox

2009-07-17T15:59:00.004-04:00

RSS feeds have never been my thing. I have a knack for forgetting about them and hence, never bothering to check, even though I might like the site I'm subscribed to. Many people just haven't really developed a routine for checking their RSS, despite decent efforts.
This is the idea behind Feed My Inbox, an innovative website that allows you to get email updates on what's happening in any RSS feed. If you're saying to yourself, "Well, what's the point of that? It takes the same amount of time to check your email as it does to check RSS," then this probably isn't the tool for you. This is a tool for people who just can't seem to get used to delving into their RSS feeds every day.
On the other hand, most internet users have developed a routine for checking their email regularly. Feed My Inbox is perfect for people who prefer email over RSS.
When you enter their homepage, you'll see a simple interface; there will be a form asking you to enter the web page that you'd like to subscribe to as well as, obviously, your email address.
As soon as you press "Submit", you'll be sent a confirmation email that has simple instructions: Either click on the first link to be officially subscribed to your desired feed or click on the second link to be unsubscribed.
However, if multiple feeds are found on the page you specified, you will be prompted to select the ones you would like to subscribe to using a checklist. Then, click "Confirm", and you will be sent the same confirmation email.
Subsequent to clicking the confirmation link, you will receive any updates to the feed you subscribed to, by email.
In addition, if you want to be able to manage your feeds in a neater way, you can create an account with Feed My Inbox.
Also, if you manage a website or blog, you can create an easily accessible form that allows visitors to quickly subscribe to your RSS feed by email. (You can subscribe to my blog by email, through Feedburner's widget on the left.)
And if you're hungry for even more convenience, this page provides a "Bookmarklet", which is a link you can add to your bookmarks and click whenever you are on a website that you want to subscribe to by email. This will take you right to the Feed My Inbox confirmation without any entering URLs or email addresses.
Wow, that's a lot of features for such a small service. And that's the magic of Feed My Inbox, the site that lets you convert RSS to email.

Top 8 Things on the Internet That Can Start Your Day Off Right

2009-07-16T16:26:00.007-04:00

The daily routine for many people involves waking up, driving to work, getting Starbucks, and then logging onto the computer. There, they first turn to their spam and might even take a peek at a few before emptying it promptly. After that, it's business as usual. Maybe angry letters from customers or a boss.
But it's a lot easier to start with something a bit more, say, idle. And since so many people seem to love to start with email already, I'll focus on email-related things.

8. Sudoku/Word Games

I'm not personally a huge fan of these, but obviously many people are because newspapers make quite a percentage of their money with these. But you don't have to go to a newspaper for these as many sites offer free puzzles sent by email. A good way to sharpen up before a meeting.

7. Word of the day

Amusing and educational, the perfect combination for a good day-starter (and it's not too fattening either). But not everybody loves a cool word. I sure do though; it's a great way to expand your vocabulary, have something to talk about at lunch and kill some time. Dictionary.com has an excellent Word of the Day Newsletter if you're interested.

6. Photoblogs/Artwork

If you just wondered to yourself, "Photoblogs, that's a pretty good idea. Why is this all the way at number 6?" then this is probably a good thing for you. However, of course, this really isn't everybody's cup of coffee, so I can't put it at number one. But I personally like photoblogs, and subscribe to the Daily Dose of Imagery. If you want to access a whole lot of other photoblogs, Photoblogs.org is likely a good idea. And I'm sure it wouldn't be hard to find a decent site that specializes in art either.

5. Good blogs

Maybe a decent sports blog, something about politics or even a personal blog; it just has to be a topic that you're interested in and that you enjoy reading. If the blog doesn't use Feedburner's email subscription tool like mine :D, then you could either take the easy path by using the RSS that is likely included (if not, read this) or use this.

4. Interesting fact or something to ponder

Another source of small talk, or something to laugh about early in the morning while you enjoy Dunkin' (or however you refer to it in the States), Starbucks or Timmy's (if you live in Canada or are an ultra-cool American).

3. Good news

Good news can cheer you up and comes in a quick and easy bundle from the good folks at the Good News Network. Here's the link to subscription. Basically, the Network broadcasts only happy news on pretty much any subject that CNN will cover (CNN takes the bad parts, the Network takes the good). And this is especially good in these times.

2. Joke of the day

This is a classic day-starter and has been around for quite awhile and is still pretty popular. And for good reason; we can all use a hearty laugh before a big day of getting grilled at a question session. Just be sure to go to my link for clean jokes or you might see a pretty noticeable pink slip on your desk a few days from now.

1. Quotations

Many like motivational quotes but sometimes a bit of pure insight can do you some good as well. There are motivational quote feeds galore out there and many other quote feeds as well. But the secret is to subscribe to this quotation feed, part of what I consider to be the most professional and complete quotation site on the web, ThinkExist.

The One Magic Rule to Blogging Success

2009-07-15T12:56:00.002-04:00

A lot of different websites give a lot of different tips that you can follow in order to reach a level of success in blogging. There's the always common SEO techniques, social networks, guest bloggers, commenting on other blogs and the likes. However, none of these pieces of advice really capture the essence of a good idea that has turned sour.
Blogging is not about having the top spot on Google or about driving 500,000 people to your site each day. It's really a life lesson just like a lot of things. That's right, bloggging is a life lesson. And the life lesson is that you have to enjoy what you're doing.
The blog has been over-glamourized for about a half-decade now. It's been called everything from the thinking man's memo to the way to the future. Everybody basically has a blog and some passionate bloggers spend hours and hours on each of their ten blogs.
That number sums up to over 200 million weblogs worldwide. That's a lot. If each of these blogs had only 25 posts (a pretty conservative estimate), you'd have to sit on26,455,026 flights from New York to Los Angeles, reading non-stop, to be able to get through all these.
So attaining fame by this means isn't exactly the best path. And it sure as heck isn't the easiest. You're not getting very many visits to your blog before at least 3 years. It's not impossible to have fantastical post that would suddenly surge to the top of Google and give you 1 million hits on your first day, but it doesn't happen often. (And trust me, I've dreamed of this many times before.)
Sometimes you just unwillingly follow the "10 Tips for Immediate Blog Traffic" but find that even doing this takes time. You have to implement a lot of things, from meta tags to a Digg counter to even subscription by email. Then, you've gotta promote, which often takes away a lot of your life. You have to act as the annoying telemarketer always adding links into your email signatures and forum signatures and everything else. And you can't forget learning internet codes, which takes days and days and you still only know the basics. You have to design all the graphics, add little widgets. In fact, I even have a checklist of all the things I need to do to a blog before I make my first post.
And the posting is the hardest. Many sites tell you to have a regular "Tuesday Ramble" or "Noon Hour Laurel" or something of the sort. Trust me, it's not easy doing that. I've never even made an attempt because that's just too much of a commitment.

On the other hand, you can do all of this. It's not hard. In fact, it's easy. But there's one condition. You have to love to blog. You have to love to go after research and make up exciting leads and struggle through the first few years. You have to love to see the results of all your codework and listen to criticism and delete spammy comments. Customizing and creating labels and titles have to be your things.
It's not something just anybody can stay with until the end. But if you keep doing all this, for three years. I guarantee you that you will have a successful blog. Blogging isn't rocket science, it's just a grueling process. It's not like inventing a new gadget or writing a poem. Blogging is about passion, not intelligence or literary skills.
I'll admit, you're only 1 of about 10 visitors I get every day. But maybe this will be my magic post. Never say never.

7 Alternative Uses for Youtube: Finding the Useful Side of The Video-Sharing Site

2009-05-28T17:14:00.000-04:00

Let's face it. Too many of us are spending way too much time on YouTube searching up the latest uselessly silly but somehow trendy videos by NigaHiga or whoever else. Sometimes it is a good dose of entertainment but when you get hooked, spending an hour or even half an hour every day on this video-sharing site, then you have a problem. YouTube should be a utility and not a time-waster so here are 7 good alternative uses for YouTube.

7. Product reviews

Reading a long, grueling product review just to pick out a few important points for 10 minutes is gruesome. On the other hand, watching a 10-minute video on the pros and cons of a product is less so. Trusted media sites and everyday people alike post videos on their favorite and least favorite things, often profane but often useful as well.

6. Getting caught up in the world

If you missed Obama's historic inauguration address, millions tuned into YouTube to watch clips of it in relatively high quality. They weren't captivated by the live moment but it's still nice to know a few good lines from the speech. There are tons of other speeches, news conferences and sporting event highlights displayed on the famed video site.

5. Expressing opinions

Here's my video on staying in Iraq and the dilemma surrounding the Iraq war. Here's another one, a prepared speech on brand name obsession, our adoration of the Abercrombies, Hollisters, American Eagles and Aeropostales. YouTube is a useful way to vent emotions and give honest opinions and insight, receiving public reaction that you could not get from just telling a few friends. Plus, you might get your four minutes of fame.

4. Instruction/Advice

Seminars are constantly posted up that might offer you some life-changing words of wisdom that you'll be able to credit YouTube for. Then there are other simple instructional videos on everyday things, from turning off a calculator to cooling a coke to making your own karaoke tracks.

3. Audio player

If you don't want to listen to radio, don't have an MP3 player, and don't have any tracks stored on your computer, then YouTube is the best option as an audio player. Just type in virtually any song and it's bound to be on YouTube. Most people like it for it's convenience and how easy it is to share music. You can just paste a link and people will be able to hear what you're hearing.

2. Promotion

Organizers might promote their event, start-up bands might promote their CDs, aspiring authors could promote their writing and publishers can promote their websites. Overall, YouTube is a great way to get publicity because no matter what, you are going to get at least 50 views within a month to pretty much any video. That's 100 more eyes on you.

1. Research

There's a lot of intriguing stuff that surprisingly never gets the millions of views that the stupid stuff gets. For a debate, I watched a few videos on gun control. And you can find videos posted by news agency, advocacy groups, companies and more on any issue. But that's not all. YouTube can be Wikipedia in videos and that's what I envision.

Top 6 Biggest Branding Mistakes and Failures: The Products Whose (Marketing) Fails to Impress

2009-05-26T17:47:00.007-04:00

There are probably plenty of worse jobs that companies have done but this is what I've come up with. This list only includes products that are still in existence and those that launched in recent history. That means New Coke and the McPizza don't count although they definitely would make the all-time list.

6. Mitsubishi Elevators

Trailing Otis, Kone and several other companies in the elevator industry, Mitsubishi itself has been a massive failure. Its televisions have almost no market share while barely anyone knows about a random food and textiles division. Simply put, Mitsubishi does not stand out with any distinctive color like Ferrari, sound like the Ford Taurus or smell like Mercedes. And that's just its cars. But has anyone ever seen and recognized and applauded a Mitsubishi Elevator? The entire corporation has simply developed a reputation of substandard quality and no uniqueness or innovation, led by a badly trailing automobile division.

5. Microsoft Zune

I have complimented this device on its quality and I still think that it's a good device but from the start, it was destined for failure. After a hyped launch, the "iPod-killer" sputtered throughout its duration on the market at prices nearly the same as the iPod. A confusing interface, lack of unique features and little online capability, the Zune just doesn't have the charm that iPods do. The Zune doesn't even have a variation of the cover flow or genius playlist generator while online features are incredibly poor. Basically, Microsoft, renowned for its no-nonsense Windows operating system, has no right to market share in the MP3 player market, which demands innovation.

4. Samsung Instinct

Don't mess with Apple. The Samsung Instinct never even had the hype that the Zune had and was and still is regarded as an iPhone spinoff. I've never personally tried this device but can tell that its appeal is not anything compared the notorious Apple iPhone. Samsung just came too late in the touch screen world and is facing not-so-great sales as a consequence.

3. Dunlop Sport

Although a good tire manufacturer, Dunlop Sport is a mistake. Athletes are considerably picky about their brands and I know I wouldn't buy tennis balls or golf drivers made by a tire company. Dunlop has never been a leading innovator in any of its sports departments, trailing Wilson and Head in tennis, is a leader in the relatively small squash market, is not even considered as a player in the badminton market, which is the same with golf.

2. Reebok Reebok

In an athletic wear market dominated by Nike and Adidas, Reebok comes in at a lowly third. In the shadow of these two foes, Reebok has a good hockey division and has an adequate share in fan merchandise in the NFL but every other sport puts this brand out of the equation. Little to no media marketing, massively overpriced items, lower quality and simply the shadow of the two giants has not helped the company.

1. GM Pontiac

Have you ever heard of CalorieLab.com? If you've been reading my blog, you have but if you haven't then you probably don't have a clue what I'm talking about. Well, you've probably heard of Pontiac. So why has CalorieLab overtaken Pontiac in daily web reach (website visitors), according to web research company Alexa? Because nobody cares about the sinking division of a sinking GM anymore. GM doesn't even care about Pontiac, which is not included in its four-division focus. This is because what does Pontiac have that's unique? Nothing. It was lauded as the new car company like Saturn. It isn't true American like Chevrolet. It isn't luxury like Cadillac. And it isn't fuel efficient like Toyota.

Do you see the similarities of all these? They all don't have any unique features and they all live in the shadows of a big-name, big-brand player in their market. This is exactly what you shouldn't do. Just some advice.

Why Testimonials Don't Convince Buyers (Anymore)

2009-05-26T17:45:00.000-04:00

Testimonials are now officially useless. But they did have a few years of glory back when these little devices were the big thing that was used to sway buyers into trusting a product. However, since then, the dawn of a new type of testimonial has come to town.
The self-testimonial has become a pretty prominent non-factor in the market of scammer websites. Joe Walker isn't a satisfied customer. Cindy Johnson sure isn't either. They're all invented by some coward who thinks he's cool making fake testimonials. And he is anything but cool because some dumb page filled with these dumb things does anything but convince at least adequately intelligent people to make any purchases.
The rare income that these scammers to get is the few people who are too tempted by the small possibility that they could lose 50 pounds in a month on a guided weight loss program that costs $50. Or maybe its a work-at-home program that costs $20 to get started.
But the vast majority of people have simply stopped going to the testimonial parts of websites. If there's a testimonials page, I advise you to immediately close the window in which there will probably be a series of other pop-ups that activate right when you do this.
The plain truth is that companies or web businesses that have seriously established themselves as a brand that can be trusted, don't need testimonials to re-inforce anything.
This is the same with television testimonials. The multicultural actors dressed in business suits, with no facial expression are more lame attempts at making you think that they are real people.
Here's a perfect example of testimonials obviously created by make-up laiden actors who barely know what they're working for. Trust me, it doesn't just happen that they all look like either weightlifters or half-genuine football dads with their goatees and everything.
It's all stupid and it's all crap. Please. Don't ever fall for a testimonial.

PicApp: An Innovation in Free Images for Blogs

2009-05-23T13:17:00.003-04:00

While reading about copyright issues with blogs, I encountered a mentioned website, so I decided to check it out. PicApp offers free images that can be publicly displayed or published on a blog for free (that means you don't have to pay).
The homepage will list the steps: Find an appropriate picture for your blog by typing in search terms as well as selecting from either the editorial (mostly celebrity) photography or stock photography (flowers, grass etc.); then, select it and embed it and your done.
First off, the library of images is updated constantly with a huge number of photos of virtually everyone who has made some type of a name for themself whether it be Adam Levine, prominent singer for Maroon 5, or Guillermo Quiroz, obscure minor league baseball catcher. Sporting events, concerts, political things, film festivals are all covered comprehensively. Food has some good listings and you'll even find results for specific lakes and mountains. However, one complaint that I do have is the fact that say, logos, a particular brand of pencil sharpener or a small business in Maine is not listed. But they're only human. They can't obtain rights to everything and the thousands or millions of photos that they do offer for free publication do make for an incredible resource.
In addition to this, once you've selected something, publishing it is easy. Click on your favorite image and a box will come up showing a preview, listing the HTML code for embedding and even letting you share the photo with others.
On the other hand, it seems that web designers have tried much too hard on the interface. It's painfully slow in virtually every process.
But in an expensive world, it's nice to know that you don't have to pay for a good image.

Micrsoft Windows Vista's Windows Speech Recognition: What Hasn't Been Said About the Voice Recognition Program

2009-05-19T17:12:00.004-04:00

There was a fair amount of hype surrounding the Windows Speech Recognition that comes standard with Windows Vista. However, this quickly died after several tests gone wrong and poor reviews galore, broadcasted across the web and on multiple television channels.
People have grown addicted to posting YouTube videos criticizing Microsoft's speech recognition engine. We've seen them speak quite clearly into a decent microphone and watch random words pop up on the screen, time and again. Clearly, it sucks when speech recognition programs don't work and your boss asks you what you mean by "fast pendulum unholy compact unicycle".
But, clearly, we all know the advantages of speech recognition engines and uses of them when they're accurate.
And I'm here to tell you that Windows Vista's standard Windows Speech Recognition software works. If you're an Apple fanboy, you're probably pretty pissed off just at the fact that I complimented Microsoft. But it is true (and by the way, I don't really like Apple).
Of course, it is not 100% effective and doesn't work miracles. After all, it isn't ObamaWare, it's software from Microsoft and you know it's going to have its flaws. In addition to that, it's a free speech recognition software as long as you purchase Windows Vista. You don't hear the phrase "free speech recognition software" very often so be very grateful of Microsoft's contribution.
Obviously, if you want to go ahead and throw $300 at Nuance's Dragon NaturallySpeaking, widely known as the best speech-to-text program out there, you can, and you will get results. But if you'd rather spend that $300 on something else, just stick with Microsoft's version.
An introduction of it for those who haven't tried it is that they'll run you through a training program that picks up your voice's characteristics for improved accuracy. This is after they do a quick configuration of your microphone. This training program will tell you all the little quirks and is incredibly easy to understand from a Microsoft thing. You can open applications, click on web links and of course type with full functionality with Windows Speech Recognition, something most other freeware can't brag about.
And then you're off and running: You say start listening to get it to start working and stop listening to get it to pause for a little while. It's pretty simple.
And as long as you're in a considerably quiet room you're good.
When you see all those videos showing the software's flaws, ignore them. They just have crappy microphones. Personally, I use a headset microphone, the "Microsoft LifeChat LX-3000", which works like a charm. But when I don't want to wear that, I find that a RocketFish desktop microphone is great too.
YouTube users who waste their time making dumb videos showcasing Microsoft's errors aren't the smartest people in our population. Don't listen to them. Windows Speech Recognition is fine. So I say, keep dictating (you'd understand if you had the program).

The Re-Birth of Newsweek: Newsweek, America's Second Biggest News Magazine has Evolved

2009-05-16T11:05:00.006-04:00

Newsweek: Now vs. Then

Newsweek has changed. For the better. The little things and the big things alike; they've added stuff, taken away stuff, modified stuff, all with a new aim to be a new magazine with a new direction of making it in a tough economy with creativity and intuitiveness. Without a doubt, it's the right step but even with the total and utter and complete makeover, it'll be tough to find success as a print publication looking for market share in these tough times.

How Newsweek Has Changed

The little things

If you ask anyone at the company, they'll probably say it's the little things that make or break a magazine. Well, Newsweek has re-made its little things into one big masterpiece. They've improved the site design, staying with the same colors and fonts but employing them in a more appealing way.
They've improved the interface with easy navigation and more convenience; the blogs are right at the top, they've put in an "In the Know" section that highlights important articles from other news agencies, they have a "News/Week" bar that shows the important stories from each day on an interactive space.
They've supplemented to the cool factor with a quote bar. But there a much bigger things as well.

The big things

Everything that you could possibly need is now at your fingertips with Newsweek's evolution. The Newsweek Newswire, although only for the featured stories, adds insight from other sources, from Wikitravel to the the Moscow Times to the New Yorker while Newsweekopedia provides a full collection of all Newsweek articles on every topic from economic stimulus to crime. And this is literally every topic ever mentioned in a Newsweek article. In addition, direct links to related stories, related Newsweekopedia topics, the best Wikipedia article and web search results from Live Search provide all you need to become a Newsweekian expert on anything.
Moreover, the weekly magazine is involves readers more, which is necessary because don't we all love being involved with the rise of video games and other interactive activities? You can be involved in a new and improved daily poll section called "Serious Fun". Plus, if you have a Twitter account, your comments on Newsweek's tweets will be played for the whole world to see. They've also intergrated their own digg-like rating tool that comes standard with each of the articles that allows you to find the best articles on Newsweek. The number of "Recommendations" is proudly displayed beside every article while the number of comments is also broadcasted.

And everything they're doing is a huge mission "to create a forum for a continuous – and continuously worthwhile – conversation about key events and issues."

Is it Going to Help?

Every company out there is cash-starved. They have to cut spending in every department. This includes marketing. What does this mean for Newsweek and every other print publication, TV show, website and outdoor signage provider (I don't know what they're actually called)? It means that they can't sell enough ad space unless they lower the prices to the point where they can no longer make profit.
As you know, none of these media companies rely on the $0.50 per issue subscriber rate or even the $5 per issue at newsstands. They rely on the advertisers. Unfortunately, a great majority of advertisers are not going to have any more marketing budget until we're out of this economic crisis. Hence, the basis of this new Newsweek is to fight for what the companies can give up for advertising. Don't get me wrong, it is still a pretty huge trade but while internet ads are popping up everywhere, print publications' share of the cashflow is shrinking.
Still, it is unquestionable that this huge makeover is going to help Newsweek obtain more advertisers than they had last week but the real mystery is whether the magazine will even be able to survive and thrive, with these additional advertisers. Ad rates are lowered and they still have less advertisers than before, despite the fact that their print publication market share has not changed by much. The print publication market is simply shrinking.

On the other hand, back to positives, Newsweek is still a strong news magazine. This is why reader response is better than ever. Instead of the 2-3 "I agrees" on Facebook, they're getting 9-10 detailed responses to big articles. Their Twitter page is doing even better and the new self-integrated recommendations system is beginning to catch on.
At the same time, Google search volume doesn't seem to be seeing much of an improvement although Newsweek is neck-and-neck in terms of volume with its closest competitor, Time Magazine.

And even if it doesn't work out accordingly for Newsweek, let's hope it survives because it's a great read and never fails to fascinate.

The Invention Trade: Buy and Sell Patents at the Free Patent Auction

2009-05-03T11:34:00.005-04:00

Inventions, ideas and everything of the sort are sold at the Free Patent Auction. Online since 2004, this site has never been the most popular one out there but haven't we all learned that it doesn't have to be popular to be useful.
At the homepage, you'll see a very simple layout, nothing fancy, mostly just text. However, the concept behind this site is a lot bigger. The basic idea is that inventors who have either lost hope or just want to make immediate profit from a patented invention, can sell these patents at often negotiable prices.
If a user of the service wants to sell a patent they can either set a price or list "to be negotiated", then write a description, give a simple diagram, add the country of protection and they'll be off and running. Of course, anybody with a patent can do this by making a free account with the Free Patent Auction.
And if buyers are particularly interest, they'll have a chance to have a peak at the seller's website, as well as access to the patent web page, all inventions from the member and contacting the seller.
At any certain time, there are usually over 1500 patents that are waiting for buyers, all categorized and searchable.
However, this is not for everyone. First of all, buying a patent costs at least $1 million and not everybody owns a marketable patent. As well, it is rare that anyone actually purchases so beware of that too. But maybe you'll be part of the lucky few who get noticed on this site and soon receive a cheque for a million dollars.

6 Reasons to Hate and Never Read Engadget

2009-05-01T09:47:00.007-04:00

Ah. Tech blogs. Everyone knows that they have to be up to date in the world of technology so everyone favours one tech blog that they read everyday. Most of the time its either one of the utter nerd tech blogs like Engadget and Gizmodo. I'm starting the non-nerd tech blog movement so read this instead. Or you can go back to your geeky texts talking about RAM, microchips and special wiring. Here's why you shouldn't read Engadget:

6. Owned by AOL

AOL, Google's friendly enemy. It doesn't have any unique features from Yahoo! and MSN and all these copied services are downgraded. I have a very personal hate of AOL and all of its entities and you should too.

5. Way too many ads

An irritatingly obviously and poorly designed ad in the wrong size between every two posts is a bit hefty. And that's in addition to all the banner ads on the sides and banner on the top. Plus, the unbearable marketing of other AOL affiliations everywhere on the page definitely counts as well.

4. Biased because affiliation

Rarely will you see Engadget promoting Microsoft or Yahoo!. After all, they're AOL's competitors ("Microsoft's Profits Sink for the First Time in 23 Years", "Microsoft to Pirates: You're Bad but You'll Still Get Windows 7 Updates").

3. Spams your RSS Feed

Do you honestly need to know about the latest "endoscope" or "Thrustmaster's" latest additions to there line-up of products? And with the tens of geeky staff bloggers (meaning they do nothing but blog about stupid crap and enjoy doing it) as well as a host of guest bloggers, they can pump out 10-20 posts like these out every day. Oh yeah, don't forget about the "USB light" either.

2. Keeps you out of touch with the real world

When you start to get hooked on reading Engadget posts all day, you know your soul has totally died. I mean, you're not even chatting on MSN Messenger, let alone socializing physically. Instead, you read dozens of posts per day on the latest features on the new Palm.

1. Super-geeky

No need for explanation. When your blog is called "Engadget", is a division of AOL and talks about the latest breaking news in the tech world such as Norway's laptop giveways, it just is.

How Amazon is Cheating Millions, and Making Big Bucks Doing It

2009-04-29T18:16:00.003-04:00

Believe it or not Amazon the huge internet retailer, comparable to Wal-Mart in the physical world has joined in the massive internet scam marketplace. Okay, they're not pulling off pyramid schemes or engaging in boiler room operations but they are doing something almost as bad. It's name, Mechanical Turk, its innovative way to make money online. Already, you should be suspicious. Apparently, it's name is derived from a wooden chess player that was believed to be run on artificial intelligence but actually had a Turkish chess player inside. And it seems innocent enough with its cute slogan, "Artificial Artificial Intelligence", but trust me, it isn't.
To summarize Mechanical Turk, it is a place where companies distribute small internet jobs such as data entry and labeling and hand a amounts of money for these jobs instead of paying individual workers to specialize in these things. The rewards can range from a penny to $20, requiring from 15 minutes to 2 months of your time. It lets workers complete "HITs" to make money, which will be channeled to you via mail.
Of course, that isn't all. There's a lot more that can be said.
To begin with, most tasks are long and gruelling, and can take days, for a few pennies. This is a distraction from what you should be doing, your job or finding a new job.
Also, this undermines users as ignorant idiots who can't do anything decent, giving them jobs like finding images and RSS URLs for websites. Of course, there is little to no reward for your effort and they set strict time limits on your work. If it isn't done by then, you'll be penalized in approval rating (which you need to "qualify" for other HITs). Can you see a relationship here? I sure can. Slavery.
And other than seeing all these people suffer for nothing, they have other benefits as well. Each time someone publishes a HIT, they get a part of the money that is supposed to go to the worker who completed it. Let's say they get 1% for each payout. For the 4,000 individual workers multiplied by the 100,000 HITs published every day, that turns into a lot of money at the loss of their users. Even Amazon has perpetrated the laws of internet ethics, even Amazon.

Why Adding Annotations to YouTube Videos is Stupid

2009-04-28T19:11:00.003-04:00

Yes, we've all seen the incredibly attractive offer of adding customizable annotations to our uploaded YouTube videos. Perhaps some of you have tried it. For those of you have avoided this, good job because they're stupid.
Basically, annotations are little blocks of text- messages that "add" to the video in some way- that you can put in different types of speech bubbles. Anyone who uploads a video or who has permission from the uploader can do it to a video.
However, these things are extremely, unbearably, harassingly annoying. If you're trying to watch a decent video about say, dinosaurs and a block of text that says, "SUBSCRIBE!" suddenly pops up from a desperate user, you're damn right it'll ruin the appeal of the video. It interrupts all the important content in the video. In fact, I don't really see much reason why these annotations can't simply be added into the description to not interfere.
There's no appropriate situation for this horrible offense. Annotations are just wrong. Don't fall into their trap.

Top 10 Stupidest Windows Vista Sidebar Gadgets

2009-04-22T18:14:00.006-04:00

The post I made yesterday talks about the best and most useful Windows Vista Sidebar Gadgets. This one is the opposite. This one talks about those useless gadgets that just serve to take up space on your hard drive:

10. Currency, unit conversions

First of all, half of these aren't even up-to-date with the constant exchange rate changes in terms of currency. But, I'll admit, you may come across a time when you would like a currency conversion and such a gadget would be great, if only it were accurate. However, this is not the same with unit conversions. No average person, has a sudden realization that if he knows how to convert centimetres to inches, his life will be better (sorry, this is the first thing that came to my mind). So forget unit conversions at least, please.

9. Mini-radios

I don't want to listen to India's news or British 88.5, if I live in Canada. If I seriously want radio, I'll either listen to a station that actually has something to do with me. Plus, with the not-that-recent advent of iPods as well as computer media players, there isn't much of a need for a radio, let alone a radio Vista gadget.

8. Countdowns

Ah, aren't these cool to take a look at once in awhile. No. Do you really need to know that there are 324 days until Christmas, or better yet, 243 days until Good Friday? You'll know when these things come; you don't need some geek who made the gadget telling you when Christmas is. And if you're actually customizing these countdown clocks to your birthday or something, get a life.

7. System control

Seriously, if you have this gadget installed, please get a treadmill and lay off the McDonalds for a little while. If you're lazy to the point where you can't even move your mouse to click on the start button and proceed to click the "Shut Down" function or something of the sort, then it'd be healthier for you not to have a computer.

6. Application launcher

Refer to number 7. Again, you can't just click on the application name on the start menu or even glance to the left and double click the icon on your desktop? May I inform you that sitting by your computer all day munching on Lays and drinking Fanta pop is not good for you.

5. Bobbleheads, animated flags, optical illusions etc.

This seems to amuse some people but doesn't really do it for me. I like Obama but I'm not going to express my support by downloading a virtual bobblehead. And downloading an animated flag is not showing that you're patriotic, it's showing that you're stupid. I don't even want to talk about optical illusions.

4. Anything in safety and security (i.e. terrorist alert, password generator)

I click on the "Safety and Security" category of the Windows Live Gadget Gallery and the first one that I see is "Terrorist Alert". To begin with, I don't trust something hosted by Microsoft with terrorism alerts. Secondly, if you're the type that downloads system control or application launcher, you probably won't be willing to get out of your seat anyway. Just keep munching, don't worry that Osama's knocking at your door.

3. System Usage

You'd better be pretty geeky to care about "system usage". For the most part, ordinary people neither care about, nor understand what "64% computer usage" and "45 GB of hard drive space left". You can buff it up with cool graphs and numbers but I refuse to download this gadget.

2. Date/clock

What the hell. If you download this, you are literally as low, if not lower than the group that downloads system control. In terms of the clock, move your pupils downwards and to the right to look at the digital clock provided instead of peering the second hand moving on a fat orange cat. But here's the hard part for you people out there. To get the date, you'll have to move your mouse all the way down the same place that you just gazed at and put your mouse over it (not click it).

1. UFO news

I just had to mention this one. UFO news. Let me just say that if you still believe in UFOs, you must have been hiding in the well for way to long. You must realize that they don't exist. Now, I'll just tell you some of the description: "Get the latest news on Ufo's, Alien abductions, Cattle mutilations and Crop circles on this planet from 80 of the worlds top researchers and radio programs." Alien abductions? Cattle mutilations? You've got to be kidding me.

If you want useful gadgets though, the best ones are listed here.

Top 10 Best and Most Useful Windows Vista Sidebar Gadgets for an Average Joe

2009-04-22T17:26:00.007-04:00

For the computer geeks out there this is not for you. That means, if you go on the computer at 6 AM in the morning to check your email, 9 AM to check Facebook and spend all day working on Microsoft Word then come home to play Warcraft, leave. Now. However, if not, you're welcome to take a look at the 10 applications that I personally find most appealing:

10. Blogger Buddy

Simply enter an account username and password and you'll be off and running. Direct links to all the blogs correlated with that account will be provided. Plus, you can compose full posts with many of the necessary formatting accessories including emphasis, hyperlinks and pictures. In fact, you can even preview the post right from the gadget before you publish. The one flaw that I've found is that you can't insert labels into the posts from this gadget.

9. Dictionary/Thesaurus

I don't care what you do for a living, there are those times when you just need a definition, spelling or synonym that you can't seem to find in your head. That's when this very simple but useful application will come in handy. It's dictionary is definitely useful although it has its flaws, with most of its entries originating from the Webster's 1913 dictionary and an odd interface but the thesaurus is surely adequate and sure is better than the few words that Microsoft Office's thesaurus provides.

8. Desk Essentials

Like a pizza, this is a lot of good stuff crammed into one thing. A detailed to-do list that features organization by priority and due date, an easily accessible notepad as well as a decent calculator that will solve small equations. In addition, it's nice to be able to print out the to-do list and notes too.

7. SportsAlert

This gadget has a ton of versatility listing scores to every NBA, NHL, NFL, MLB and NCAA basketball game. It's reliable with occasional updates but there's not much more to say; it's just a good application.

6. News

It doesn't really matter what you want here. I'm just throwing this search term out there. Most versions already have a news reader installed but you might prefer a particular brand of news, perhaps the USA Today.

5. WeatherBug

Although I don't personally like this particularly, it's consider a basic essential that you just have to have. You can set your location very easily and this gadget will retrieve temperatures, satellites, photos, wind gusts, precipitation and HI/LO reports daily.

4. Facebook Sidebar

At this point, pretty much everyone has a Facebook account. Well with this application, you can satisfy your craving for a constant view of Facebook updates. This displays messages, pokes and all invitations as well as friend requests. Moreover, you can update your status as long as you authorize this action.

3. zCalendar

This is a very cool gadget, which, along with showing the date (my favorite part), lets you add events, which you can customize with your own notes. To add, this application will play a little chime as an alert if you enable it at a set time before the event starts.

2. All Search

Type in any search term, select a search engine from the list that includes Google, Yahoo!, Live, eBay, Amazon, the weather, dictionary, Youtube and Wikipedia. This will instantly open your Internet Explorer taking you to the search results page for the particular engine. Really easy, really convenient.

1. Email

Ah, email. How can you forget this. I can't pinpoint you to the exact gadget because I don't know what service you use. But you need this. Trust me.

5 Ways to Save Your Eyes While on the Computer

2009-04-20T16:50:00.003-04:00

These days all the talk is about weight loss and keeping your heart healthy. However, not many are as worried about their eyes, with vision probably your most valuable sense. But I understand you have to go on the computer, especially with blogs like this one (just joking!), so I won't tell you how to stop going on the computer or to relieve your eyes once you're done. I'll just tell you what to do while you're on to just help them out a bit.

5. Look away when the screen is white

White is a pretty irritating colour for your eyes, particularly when its on a computer screen. Plus, there's no point in staring at a blank screen so may as well look away, just to give your eyes a bit of a break.

4. Get a better monitor

Believe me, this helps. A flat monitor is always better then a rounded one while the higher the resolution, the better. I recommend any brand other than Acer. Although these ones are cheap, they are incredibly irritating for your eyes.

3. Lower the contrast and brightness

Your eyes hate contrast and brightness. They'll relax a bit more without as much contrast and brightness and you can see everything perfectly fine even with a bit less.

2. Don't stare to intently

I know sometimes you have to stare intently to read but this hurts your eyes a lot. Just train yourself to relax your eye muscles while watching videos or reading. This usually means basically not dilating your eyes and letting them be a bit lazy, if you get what I mean.

1. Take breaks

Ah. I hate to do this but it just helps you so much. It keeps your muscles loose, keeps you energetic and of course it helps your eyes. But don't just walk out of your office to stare at a newspaper's size 10 font or a TV screen. Go for a walk outside or just look into the distance every 45 minutes or so.

Use Your Webcam to Take Photos Online: Cameroid

2009-04-19T11:33:00.004-04:00

Before today, I had a pretty Logitech webcam sitting on my desk for the past three months, lacking any possible use. It did make look like I knew a bit more about computers than I actually do and the little neon-green light on the top is always cool to ogle but otherwise, I hadn't really found any use for it (by the way, I also have a sick microphone that hasn't ever been used either but I know how to use that). But that's when I found Cameroid, an free online utility that lets you snap a few pictures using your webcam without any complicated software.
The simple interface is really well-done and error-free made by the good guys at Sideshow Digital. Basically, there are two main pages, the homepage and the "snap" page. The homepage, is just, well, the homepage with your normal introduction and a few sample photos, but the other tab is what will really make your day.
To begin with, you'll be prompted to allow access to your webcam and obviously you should click "allow" so you can actually try this out. After this, you'll see what your webcam sees on the screen so you can be totally satisfied with what will be captured. Plus, if you want to, at this point you can apply several fun edits, from distortion filters that'll screw up the colours to creating a kaleidoscope-like image, to inserting your face into the Mona Lisa. Select a filter or just create an unedited photo and snap.
As a final touch, you can save your image to the public gallery, download it as a JPG or print right there. Of course, if you don't like it, you can just throw it out and try again.
You can take pictures of your face, your thumb, your dog, your hamster or your favorite pencil. And trust me, it'll be a lot more satisfying when you can actually use your webcam.

When Google's Search Statistics Masterpiece, Google Trends, Stops Working

2009-04-18T17:27:00.003-04:00

Cataclysm. Halo pet food. Danbury mint. All very cool phrases. All meaningless. All prominently appearing on Google Trends' Hot 100 searches list. Since it's launch as a part of Google Labs, Trends has been hailed as one of the best tools for marketers. I've been making a decent effort to use this service but it just doesn't seem to do much other than satisfying my craving for interesting search facts.
Sure, it'll make you go "Hmm. That's interesting," but otherwise, I don't see much of a use. This is mostly because it doesn't really do much in the means of working as a keyword research tool (don't worry if you don't know what that means) with the constant sight of peculiar search terms like, today, "ice hotel", "in plain sight", "rejuventation pills" and "catching grapes with my mouth" (what the hell?).
In my mind, this doesn't exactly help me in finding something to blog about that people will read. Of course, comparing keywords is always cool to see although only occasionally helpful.
This is mainly because all of the numbers that Google Trends provides are in comparison to the average volume for that search term. This means that instead of giving you a straight number like 10,000 searches in the past two days, the service gives you, three times the average at the time or two times below average at this time (all on a fancy line graph, obviously). This means that often perception would be distorted because sure something can be at five times the normal volume or even twenty times for all I care. Then, you might get all excited thinking that this is a truly hot trend in terms of searches. On the other hand, the normal volume could be three searches every day. So sixty searches every day is what you're getting all excited about. In fact, even the hot trends are based on how much a particular search surpasses its average volume. "Catching grapes in my mouth" happens to "not have enough search volume to show graphs."
That means a possible explanation for this could be tampering. For instance, if "catching grapes in my mouth" has five searches every day (I wonder who these five people are), and some mischeivous computer geek decides he wants to screw Google up, he'll just call all his friends and he and all these people might each search a this twenty times. This would lead to quite a bit of corruption to the Trends. And even if Google tracks IP address, if a prankster's smart, then he'll just go behind a proxy, which hides IP address.
So maybe Google Trends will serve its purpose some day in the next few years and somebody at Google will find a sick new algorithm, but for now, Google Trends will never pass through my bookmark filter.

The Ultimate Spam Filter: Create a Disposable Email Account with NowMyMail

2009-04-13T12:04:00.004-04:00

If you're like me, you love to sign up for a lot of things and you end up with a lot of spam in your inbox (how about 10 every hour). And sure Yahoo! has got a decent spam filter and Gmail's is even better but none are flawless. But you've gotten used to it; you just have to give out your email for some of these contests even though they send you the prize in your mailbox.
But there's no need to face deleting all those messages anymore with NowMyMail, the disposable email service. It's pretty simple and there's not very much to talk about so I'll make this quick.
Whenever you see a contest that you just have to sign up for because they're giving away a $150 Starbucks gift card, but you don't see much of a point in giving your email away, just go to NowMyMail.
With a single click, you can create a disposable email that might be something like "jspkvfwcgg@nowmymail.com". This will create an inbox where you can view emails in plain text and delete them as well. Of course, you can't reply (and it wouldn't be smart replying anyway). This email account will be remembered for up to an hour if you have cookies enabled on your browser, even if you close the page.
And after your done with it, it just deletes itself so you don't have to worry about it anymore while the sender's email will be flooded with Mail Delivery Errors.
Plus, it's free!

Track Changes to Any Site, Without RSS: Create an RSS Feed with Feedity

2009-04-12T12:21:00.004-04:00

Finding a new site is always fun, especially when it's actually has some use. But having to check for changes every single day isn't. You're probably thinking, "RSS feeds, idiot!" The thing is though, that not every website has one of these little things. But you don't have to worry about that anymore with Feedity. Yes, you probably have never heard of this page before and not many have, but boy can it be useful.
Say, you're a mechanic or something of the sort, and want to track anything new at GM. Naturally, you would go to GM's corporate site, and naturally, you would find that the RSS feed button is greyed out (meaning that there's no feed for those of you who don't know). Then you're thinking, "Screw this, I don't need some stupid GM site to stay on top of things." Of course, because GM is the best car manufacturer that has ever existed (better than your Toyota and Honda), you do happen to need to know what's happening at GM.
So you go over to Feedity! The first thing you'll see is a little bar where you enter the URL of the website you want to track. Therefore, you just enter your little "gm.com" after the http://.

Subsequently, you can click the preview button and quickly, Feedity will generate a preview of what will be included in your feed. Of course, you can apply any changes you might want to apply to your new feed, selecting a specific part of the GM page that you want to look at with the "Refine" section. You might want to keep track of "Current Offers", the "Help Center" or perhaps the "GM Heritage Center". You can even enter an "Advanced Refine", which allows you to select the exact HTML tags you want your new feed(ity) to track the content between- that is, if you're into that sort of stuff.
Finally, you just select a category, obviously, "Automotive", press "Get Feed" and you're pretty much done!

When you do this, they'll immediately provide you with a link that leads you to another page, which will be your generated RSS. Plus, you can subscribe to this feed using your Google Reader, My Yahoo!, Bloglines and more. And if you create a free account, you can save this feed to your account, get more frequent updates and make multiple feeds.
But don't be turned off by the "Pricing" tab; it's all a free service as long as you're not asking for a 99.5% uptime, 100 items per feed, advanced statistics and updates every half hour (if that's what you're interested in, you'll have $369 less to spend on premium auto parts).
And trust me, you'll be this enthusiastic too, once you visit this free RSS feed generator.

Can Google Answers 3 Compete with Yahoo! Answers?: Google TipJar

2009-04-11T10:16:00.004-04:00

Yet another re-birth of Google's original futile fee-based attempt at getting into the knowledge market market, launched in April 2002. This initial site, dubbed Google Answers, has since shut down (December 2006) and was replaced by Google Questions and Answers. This version has made little to know progress since its beginning in June 2007 still posing no competition to Yahoo! Answers, which was actually launched three years after the launch of Google Answers. Questions and Answers is still available only in Russian and Chinese, although it is possible to access the actual websites, you just won't be able to use them (unless you're loyal enough to use a translator to translate every page on the site).
However, the long-awaited truly Yahoo! Answers-esque Google version of a knowledge market has arrived in the form of TipJar. This site is barely a few weeks old so it's hard to give constructive criticism that is really valid but right now, I must say, it is crap. If Google continues like this, they can forget about their ambitions of competing with Yahoo! in answers sites, let alone beating them.

Firstly, the entire website is extremely confusing to the point where you can almost sue them for criminal harassment. There are several different question views, links that take you to blank pages and links that serve to confuse you. Bunches of useless features also exist that include organizing specific users' tips by most popular and least popular as well as organizing your votes by most recent and least recent.
Also, there is no incentive for giving sharing tips or voting with no understandable points system, no ranking system, no levels and no profile customizability to show the outside world your expertise. This pretty much takes away the factor of addictiveness from the equation making TipJar a sure failure.
In addition to this, looking to capitalize on the economic downturn Google has created this site bearing only money-saving tips with no other aspects being covered. Nobody is going to check TipJar daily for money-saving tips. Plus, you can't really ask questions. You can share tips but you cannot ask questions. You're just basically stuck with seeing if you get lucky and find exactly what you're looking for in their database of roughly 5000 tips, not exactly the easiest task in the world.
And they must have really rushed to get this site up because the design is unbelievably poor. It's apparent that they made an effort the create a modern-looking site but failed miserably, creating a Yahoo!-like stuck-in-between-modern-and-oldies site. The icons suck, the logo sucks, the font choice sucks, the layout sucks and even the favicon sucks. And the lime-green color scheme is an utter eyesore that will turn you off immediately.
Further, the vote system that Google uses to decide which tips are good and which are bad is useless. If a money-saving tip is good, people know it's good and don't need green bars telling them what advice they should take.

And of course, who can forget the unbearably buggy system pops up a "[log] Google Moderator" page filled with random text every time you move to a different page on the site. Other smaller things that will begin to piss you off is the all lower-case alt text, screwed up mouseover reactions and the bottom toolbar that never moves from your screen.
Naturally, with all this, users are taking this service as an utter joke. In fact, some of the more popular tips include "Don't eat yellow snow", "Don't speed" and "Don't do drugs", which sure, are all good tips, for idiots.

How You'll Be Able to Survive When Internet Ads Stop Working: Part Two of the Two-Part Series

2009-04-07T18:29:00.006-04:00

This is the second part of the two-part series commenting on internet ads. This post will tell you what you can do when internet ads inevitably stop working. If you want to read the first post, click here.

So when Google Adwords, Yahoo's ad service or whatever else you use stops working in a half a century, here's your toolbox for what to do. Be sure to bookmark this post because you never know when you'll need it.
First of all, if you're so keen on staying loyal to internet advertising, one way to use it would be to make any ads less apparent. The latest innovation has been content links, which are the double-underline links that are actually ads. However, most people have realized what these do by now and internet-saavy users will quickly see through any trick ads so if you choose this option you'll have to just keep making your ads less and less discreet.
And of course, there are many other means of advertising a site as well. Print ads (which are fading even faster than their internet counterparts), TV ads and billboard ads are all alternatives. Further, soon you'll have to start being creative with how you market. Some sites have robot voices who shout out their URL in the background of MP3 files while some people put bumper stickers with their URL printed on them onto their cars.
What is essential though because of all the scams that go on these days is establishing a good image. You must demonstrate that your company/website isn't one of those scam sites. This means obviously no scams. However, you can go a step further; make your page look professional and even help out in the community.
The important part of all this though, is SEO. If you don't know what this is (shame on you if you have a full domain and don't know what this is), it stands for search engine optimization. Basically this means modifying your site to make it appear more prominently in search engines, the main tools that people use to look for web pages. And the our love for Google and the likes will likely not cease for a long, long time because of how much they have been engraved into our everyday lives. Hence, you can keep feeding off of search engines, which will probably always be your top referring sites in terms of visitors. However, SEO isn't exactly an easy process; it takes a lot of time and effort. There are tons of guides on the internet that tell you all about the meta tags, alt tags, keyword research, emphasis, directory submission, incoming links and all the other boring stuff involved in creating a website.
But face it, that's what you'll have to deal with if you want to make it in the internet world. This is what you will be subject to do when the day comes.

Why Internet Ads Will Stop Working: Part One of a Two-Part Series

2009-04-07T18:08:00.004-04:00

The heavily favoured internet advertising, whether it be search-engine ads, banner ads, pop-up ads or link ads, are gaining in popularity every day. They're flexible, dependable and proven to improve traffic- at least for now. Google, Yahoo! and some of the biggest tech corporations in the world run on the effectiveness of these ads and the massive number of people who use them. However, this huge number is the reason why the effectiveness is slipping.
In the world today, a lot of people are trying to get your attention. There are the pesky tele-marketers, the store managers and the CEOs, each wanting to take some benefit from you, possibly leaving you worse off than before. In the old days, if somebody wanted to chat, we'd quickly grant that request with a genuine trust and friendly spirit.
But these two crucial aspects are becoming endangered. People are now more aware and don't want to fall into any traps. They won't agree to anything unless they've digested all the information coming at them carefully. Still, sometimes this is not careful enough, leading some to simply stop agreeing.
And this is not without merit. Scams, lies, corruption and deception are profuse these days with everyone taking a shot at the big market of exploitation. Identity theft, hacking and viruses are just a few of the ways that we are cheating.
After this, comes awareness campaigns enforcing that people be heedful of any of these scams. The only problem is that sometimes people are a bit too heedful. They won't give anything a chance. In fact, they won't even click on a link.
That's the important part.
So many people are attempting to trick people that nobody's trusting anyone else, which could lead to disaster for the internet world. We've defined conditions in our mind for legitimacy that filter out even pages with some degree of decency. Is this fair? No when you consider the good sites but yes when you consider what can happen.
Moreover, our time is more valuable than ever now. We aren't willing to spare a single second with something that we don't immediately deem useful, making for a bit of a dilemma.
Plus, our knowledge and demands are getting higher by the second, we direct our attention to the left column with the actual search listings on Google and totally ignore any sponsored links.
So our love of taking advantage of others and need for wariness is going to bite us one day. The countdown has started and is limited. We'll never know when we'll lose our patience and the clock will hit zero.

Stay tuned for the next part of the series: How You Can Get Through.

Opening Day: 5 Ways to Keep Track of the Baseball Game If You Don't Have a TV

2009-04-06T17:44:00.004-04:00

You're on the subway, you're at work, you're at school or you just want an excuse not to watch your team lose miserably in high-definition (ahem, Seattle, Toronto and Washington fans). Either way, when everyone's talking about the game tomorrow and you didn't even catch the highlights, then watch your neck, especially when your boss is a drunk baseball fan. Here's a few ways to (half) catch the game without ever having to leave your computer:

5. Check the score

If you do this for opening day, then you can no longer consider yourself a baseball fan. However, it is one of the techniques, although it can only be reserved for loners. And if you don't know how to do this, you need help: There's Facebook applications, sports websites, Windows Sidebar tools and everything in between.

4. MLB.TV

Another thing you can do is pay a hundred bucks for something you'll never actually used. I don't recommend this. Yes, you have your pause and rewind, DVR features, "high-definition quality" and everything else, but it's a hundred friggin' bucks (that's over 50 beers).

3. Radio live audio broadcasts

Chances are your baseball team has some sort of a radio station that broadcasts its games in audio. Also, this station hopefully supports online listening. This is the best way if your team has a station. The thing is though, most radio broadcasters are washed up commentators who got cut from ESPN.

2. Yahoo! Sports GameChannel

Don't we all love Yahoo? Here's another reason to love the good guys at Yahoo! Sports. The GameChannel. Not as bad as checking the scores as they support play-by-play, box-scores, full stats, player info and a better interface.

1. ESPN the next morning

If you're that keen on not watching the game but not getting fired, then just watch ESPN the next morning; they'll have the juicy parts, they'll tell you the score, they'll give you a few interesting facts.

How to Find a New Job: The Part CNN Doesn't Talk About

2009-04-05T17:23:00.004-04:00

With unemployment at an all-time high, the economy barely limping, your money being channeled directly to Wall Street CEOs and the general progress of America and the world at a seemingly endless halt, sometimes it's hard to find the energy to get up and look for a job. Sometimes determination, drive and tenacity just fails you. This is when motivation is essential.
However, these days, the talk seems to focused only on how bad unemployment is getting, more job cuts and people's unfortunate stories; all negative. And even the things telling you how to get your job back are centred around your resume, social networking and the laborious searching.
Wings For The Heart will give you that extra boost to actually start doing these things. On the other hand, only a few people have even heard of this website.
With a great library of motivational articles as well as articles of guidance of the kinder sort, this site will truly bring out your brighter side. Wings For Heart Can help you with weight loss motivation, stress management, self-esteem, gratitude, positive thinking and a lot more.
Plus, the e-mail newsletter is great for motivation on your mobile device or when you just don't have time to go to the website. As well, specialized e-mail e-courses as well as e-books and the always wonderful motivational quotes will definitely set you on the right track.
And of all the websites I've talked about, this is one of the few that can truly change your life and let you "love, trust, open, surrender, believe, live, breathe, shine, soar, become ... and more".

Why You Should Stop Searching For An Online "Stay-At-Home" Job

2009-04-04T13:33:00.003-04:00

In your days, you've probably seen quite a few "Take Surveys for Cash" or "Click for Cash" or "Fill in Forms for Cash" and the likes. I've seen my share of these and tried way too many. Now my inbox is filled with spam telling me that I can "Make $10,000 in 1 week".
It's never bad to try things on the internet because you never know what you'll be able to find that's of use. However, this general rule has the exception of "high-paying" online jobs that "let you work your hours" from the "comfort of your own home".
In this recession some begin to get desperate and instead of looking for honest ways to earn money, they look for easy ways to do it. They surf the web looking for online jobs and try out every last one that they find, with the glimmer of hope never ceasing to shine. They get optimistic every time they see the cheesy fake testimonials, six-figure promises and half-professional website designs.
But these don't work. You've heard the success stories and it is true, perhaps a handful of people have actually done well on the web (mind you most of these stories are fabricated), but just because the guy down the street did it, doesn't mean you can do it. It's not like cooking or knitting or fixing a car. There's no good recipe. On the other hand, there sure are a lot of recipes that'll result in burned chicken.

To begin with, it takes a ton of time to do each form, filling out your contact information and then trying to get off the ground just to find that nothing's happening. This is precious time that you can be using to try to find a job with a steady, honest income.
Also, there are sites that work, but these sites won't be close to enough to support a family or even a single person. Most might give you a few cents every third day for hours and hours of work but that won't even be enough for an ant.
Moreover, the scams that happen every day should immediately turn you off. If you stay in the business long enough, your identity will be stolen. I guarantee it. You can get into a lot of trouble with the law yourself as well because many of these pages are illegal or get you into legal trouble.

A rule is, if it's too good to be true, it isn't. Another rule is that if there's tons of emphasized and capitalized letters, neon bright colours, highlighted words and video testimonials, don't trust it. And finally,
you can't make money online with anything. It could be reading emails, sending emails, taking surveys, or even writing reviews. You just can't do it.

10 Reasons to Stick to Google Adsense

2009-04-02T17:33:00.005-04:00

Google Adsense is the most used ad program in the world and with good reason.

10. Integrated into Blogger.

If you have a blog that you didn't pay for, chances are, you use Blogger and it's always nice having a convenient little tab called "Monetize" that lets you add and customize ads that you want to display on your blog.

9. They'll help.

This is great for newbies. Like all Google services, Adsense has one of the most useful help sections in all of the internet, detailing every feature, fact and technique there is. They'll guide you through pretty much everything.

8. No spam ads.

A problem with a lot of smaller Adsense alternative is that they have to resort to misleading ads that link to malicious, cheat or illegal sites that pay more. However, with the larger audience, Google doesn't have to so you're safe from any complaints or lawsuits.

7. They find the ads for you.

The problem with a bunch of ad publishers is that they make you link up with an ad displayer, which is a long, gruelling process suited only for sites with a ton of views. And in the meantime, they often display ads that don't pay you a single penny, which is really frustrating.

6. No traffic conditions.

A bunch of the "premium" ad sites that are pretty much the same as Adsense demand that you have at least 100,000 individual page views every month, or some other outrageous number for smaller pages. However, Adsense doesn't require a certain number of views or clicks or click-through rate. On the other hand, it's not like they don't have conditions; there's a great deal of restricted types of content, quality guidelines (you need a site map), rules you have to follow and other things, but it's easier to obey these than traffic conditions.

5. They will actually pay you.

You can trust a company like Google to pay you because they want to retain their reputation. But other sites aren't as trustworthy and have not reputation to retain. There are a lot of scam ad publishers that just keep the money to themselves with creative little schemes. However, it's not going to be a way to earn a living; and the $10/click that Bidvertiser offers is pretty attractive compared to the few cents that Google is giving you. Trust be though, it'll be better in the long run.

4. Relevant ads.

It's hard not to find an ad that has something to do with what your site's about in Google's massive database. And you know the deal with their amazing search algorithms that are bound to find something.

3. Low payment threshold.

Last time I checked (a few minutes ago), the minimum payment was only $10 (US) while many other companies demand $20, $50 or even $100 worth of clicks/impressions for you to claim anything. This is fine for some people but definitely not for the hardworking little guy on main street.

2. Most reliable.

First of all, it's not like ads are suddenly all going to disappear because the server crashed or the code screwed up; that'll probably never happen. Also, that little symbol that reads the familiar "Ads by Google" is enough to tell someone that they aren't going to be mislead, obviously leading to more clicks.

1. Most feature-rich.

I can't really stop talking about Adsense's features. You can display the ads in different formats, on different types of sites, in different places, with easy earnings tracking, on multiple different sites with the same account. This is just the beginning.

On the other hand, I'm going to stick with my Bidvertiser just because my blog isn't exactly at an advanced stage yet. When it reaches a decent number of page views though, I'll definitely make the switch.

The Stock Market- Sports Style: Protrade

2009-03-29T13:46:00.004-04:00

So I was surfing the web for a decent interactive sports site and it looks like I pretty much hit gold. ProTrade calls itself "The Sports Stock Market", which immediately lured me in. I'd always liked fantasy sports but really wanted to participate in a sports stock market and I finally found one.
With ProTrade, you start off with 5000 points to use to buy different players after you register for a free account. With these points (no cash value), you basically buy teams and players in NASCAR, MLB, NHL, PGA, NBA and NCAA. Their value can go up and down basically depending on their performance (Alexander Ovechkin is well over $300 while Casey Janssen is around $50 and you earn or lose money based on this.
So the concept is pretty similar to that of the stock market although quite a bit easier.
However, it only gets better. You also can join challenges that can even give you more points or real live cash or gifts. Plus, if you get enough points, you can redeem them for prizes that include iPods and Amazon gift card. Just one catch, to earn the prizes, you have to be in the U.S. and pay $1-$10 as well as a sum of points.
In addition, you can also create a little profile along with a bit of a blog that you can submit sports opinions, news and stories to. You can also read others' blogs and comment as well.
So it's sports dynamite and a more addictive alternative to fantasy sports.

6 Reasons Why You Don't Need the New iPod Shuffle

2009-03-28T15:09:00.005-04:00

People have been oohed and ahhed by the new iPod Shuffle but I certainly have no intention on ever using it. Here's why:

6. The battery life is worse.

With all the new useless features, it appears that Apple has sacrificed one very useful one, battery life. You'd expect the designers to easily have increased this, especially with the iPod Shuffle that doesn't support video or any screen capabilites.

5. You can only use Apple's earphones

And even Steve Jobs would probably admit that these aren't exactly the best quality. However, these are the only ones programmed to work with the Shuffle so if you break them (very likely to happen), you can't just go into an old shelf and find new ones to keep listening: You'll have to instead wait until next Saturday to go to Best Buy to get a new set.

4. Small = breakable + losable

Apple describes their latest device as "durable" with it's "anodized aluminum case" (what the hell?) but that's pretty hard to believe when the thing's not even as wide or thick as a key. Plus, it doesn't really matter what it's made out of once it falls out of the tiny whole in your backpack or that little part that you just don't bother to zip up.

3. Much more advanced iPods

With the new iPod Nano, iPod Touch and iPhone, I don't see much of a point of downgrading to a measly Shuffle, even in these times. Shuffles don't have cover flow, a screen, FM tuners, screens, applications, e-mail or wi-fi.

2. Unimpressive new features

Let's see what they've put in. A new colour (black), a few more playlists, a new and improved on-off switch. Sure the storage is pretty good but as I have demonstrated, the tininess might not be.

1. VoiceOver; Apple's newest crappy idea

Now let's talk about the robotic, monotone voice that is customized to whether you have a PC or Mac. This is supposed to tell you the songs and playlists but it does start to get annoying listening to the poorly pronounced words every single day. Also, unless you download random songs, you'll probably know most of what's on your iPod and don't need variations of Microsoft Sam telling you what they are. And if you really need a friend, try this.

No More Customization for Yahoo! Music LAUNCHcast Radio

2009-03-26T17:41:00.004-04:00

Although I just found it out today, it seems that since early February, the personalized radio feature that I've grown to love from Yahoo! Music has been banished. It has been replaced by none other than the craptastical CBS Radio, which apprently now runs Yahoo! LAUNCHcast.
With this, the whole good part, the customization, is sucked out of this radio. Basically, now all you can customize is what the music genre that you want to listen to is. You can pick Today's Biggest Hits, Hard Rock, Adult Alternative and quite a bit more but that sure doesn't beat what it was before. You would pretty much pick which songs played with your specified music preferences.
You may say this is a financial decision now Yahoo!, but soon you'll regret this very much. Very, very much. Well, actually I still like Yahoo!, I'll just take it out on CBS; no more CBS on my TV. So ha!

The Long Lost Secret About Selling on Ebay: What We've All Forgotten

2009-03-25T18:26:00.005-04:00

What is right there is not always apparent. This is certainly the case with selling on Ebay. It seems that everyone has forgotten about or is deciding to disregard the one most important aspect of any online marketplace: Trust.
Buying online isn't like going to the store; you can't sample or touch any item, read the package and know you're getting the real deal. Hence, the buyer must trust the seller regarding the quality of the product.
WIth this requirement come another: To earn this trust. Most people know exactly what this means in real life but don't seem to be very web-aware.
To begin with, do not use all caps. While this attracts attention, I can assure you that it doesn't attract customers. Consider it, would you buy anything that has all it's specifications in an amateurish Arial all-caps?
Further, you don't have to be a great photographer to post a decent image of your item. One thing you must not do is retrieve a generic one from Google Images because again, this is unprofessional and appears extremely untrustworthy.
One more small thing that I still see for some reason is links to your blog or website with promotion in mind. Ebay isn't a classifieds host so don't use it as one. It definitely loses my trust nice and quickly if I see blue underlined text.
Lastly, make an effort to create as complete of an auction as possible. Specifiy the shipping price and means instead of leaving it blank, make a "Buy it Now", and insert all the product information (model number, size, battery life, warranty, colour, regular price etc. can make something incredibly impressive). One more tip, if you use sophisticated but understandable language, you'll garner more trust. And of course, your seller rating and feedback makes the biggest difference while a reasonable price that isn't too good to be true is crucial. But hopefully, that's obvious.
So happy money-making!

10 Things to Consider When Designing a Corporate Website

2009-03-22T13:25:00.005-04:00

10. Images and graphics

These are absolutely crucial to the success of a website, but you have to find a balance of words and images. Moreover, many visuals these days are unbearably cheesy and most of these come in the form of animations and marquees. So eliminate any of these that still linger on your site. Otherwise, just remember to stay wary of copyright laws and try to manipulate the image's features (maybe form a collage with the main colours).

9. No ads

Your purpose should not be to generate revenues directly from your page, infuriating viewers in the process, but to utilise your page to generate revenues with your products. Of all things, probably the least impressive on a corporate site would be that little logo that says "Ads by Google".

8. Not too many words

You want to be concise because when at a company web page, most people have a very short attention span and if you don't cut right to the chase, they'll just say "Whatever", and turn away. However, you do have to get a message across but do this in as few words as possible.

7. Legible first, likable second

You might really like both red and neon green as colours but the inconvenient truth is that if you make such a canvas, it will look amateur and nobody will be able to read it. The specific colours might be popular colours but if they can't see anything, then there's really no point.

6. Simple but not plain

Some people like to mask their sites with a bunch of stupid code from backgrounds to countdown clocks to marquees. This creates clutter and clutter as a company message never works. On the other hand, some people don't know a thing about code and type in the little HTML that they know and try to get away with it. This doesn't work either. Here's a good example of finding the balance and it's not as hard as you may think.

5. Dress to impress

If it's within your budget capability, hire a professional web designer to make a decent design, appealing to the eye and professional (this is important). Otherwise, you'll have to find a good, unique layout from the internet and use that. Unless you are adept in web design, don't you dare try to model your site on your own.

Here's an example:
Professional vs. Unprofessional

4. Don't overload

Overloading means putting either too much information, too many images or too many invisible tools. This, first of all confuses and hence puts off potential customers, and second of all takes of valuable loading time. Quality is vital, quantity definitely isn't.

3. Navigation should be easy

Although this isn't exactly a corporate site, this is the one site that comes to mind when I think of poor navigation. If you use it, you'll note that the links aren't organized in a box or at the top in tabs or even in a sitemap. Instead, the text contains a bunch of links to the most crucial parts of the page that you need to carefully try to find. Also, there's no search bar. So basically, links shouldn't be contained inside text unless they're outgoing or are duplicates to ones at the top or on a sidebar. Also, if you can make your search feature more complex than just matching words, that helps as well.

2. Should reflect your vision

If your vision is modern views, use modern colours such as white on black or green as well as modern sans serif fonts. Anyway, before you even contemplate making a site, you must consider your vision and how you are going to portray this in your web page and just about everything else you make or do.

1. Promote, don't advertise

Advertisements are on TV, newspapers, magazines, other website but not your own page. You should definitely speak highly of your products or services but don't sound to enthusiastic or generic because this gets into the realm of advertisements. And definitely, don't put videos of your TV ads on your site because you think people will be intrigued by them. This is one of the stupidest things you can do.

A Less Than Comprehensive Guide to Getting Free Stuff

2009-03-18T19:03:00.006-04:00

In tough economic times, everyone needs a ... boost here and there. Free stuff is a boost both financially (sorta self-explanatory) and mentally (it's pretty fun and satisfying getting stuff for free). This is your unofficial step-by-step guide to obtaining your goods and saving a few bucks in the process.

1. Free Stuff Sites

There are so many of these that it's not even funny. Google "free stuff", "free stuff sites" or "freebies" and millions of pages will flood your screen. One good thing to do is to type in your country so offers are available in your area ("Canadian free stuff" or "Australian free stuff"). As well, you might want to subscribe to these sights through RSS or add them to your favorites.

2. Free Stuff Newsletters

These sites occasionally will have newsletters to subscribe to notifying you of new offers. A few are:
www.totallyfreestuff.com/newsletter.asp
www.freebielist.com/

3. "Free ..." Searches

"Free baseballs", "free magazines", "free pencils", whatever. This turns up more direct results and generally the results that these searches retrieve are more trustworthy than free stuff sites.

4. Look for it

If you're at your favorite store's site, keep a keen eye out for any small boxes in the corners that either offer free items if you buy another thing or offer you free things if you sign up for something. Furthermore, when you're actually at the store, there might be free samples or at grocery stores, often they give away free newspapers or magazines.

5. Giveaways/Sweepstakes/Contests/Draws

Don't count on winning too many of these but if ever you win $10,000 or a car, all those hours will be worth it. However, don't pay to enter contests and don't give too much contact information either. Usually, just look at the site's design to see if you can trust them; if it's sleek and professional, then it's good.

6. Free Samples

Believe it or not, free samples are everywhere- you just have to find them. And this isn't as hard as you think. They're not buried that deep and most free stuff sites have a section devoted to free samples while company homepages often have links to free sample promotions. Again, just have to have a keen eye.

7. Coupons

Pretty much every store has their coupons, whether in the form of promotional codes to be used online or printable coupons. So before you make a purchase, always look for ways to get discounts. My favorite coupon sites are RetailMeNot, MommySavesBig, CouponCabin and DealTaker .

8. Reminder

Remember to exercise judgment when looking for these things. First of all, if it's free then why the hell would they need your credit card information; and don't fall for some lame excuse like "we are contractually obligated" or something. Also, there are tons of scam sites that make you think you're getting something for free, but in reality, you'll end up having to pay. A few rules: If it's a pop-up, don't trust it; read the small text; no detailed contact information (address is understandable).

Top 5 Reasons Why You Should Never Upgrade To Microsoft Office 2007

2009-03-17T13:50:00.003-04:00

These days, there are plenty of things with plenty of dumb, useless features. However, somehow Microsoft found a way to sit itself at the top of this list with Microsoft Office 2007. If they're planning a new Office, I'm not aware of this but I'm quite sure it will also be crap. So here are the top 5 reasons why you should never upgrade from Office '03.

5. Defaults have been toyed with

So they decide they want to remove the ruler, change the default fonts to Calibri and Cambria, the default font size to 11 and many other things that you and me will never find.

4. A new interface

Office users are not all stupid. We don't need boxes to come up whenever we hover over a button and we absolutely don't need some geek at Microsoft deciding where the toolbars should go. In 2003, you could customize everything so it suited your needs; now they have a special organization that can't be altered.

3. Stupid features

You'll never come across, use or understand half of the features that are included in 2007 whether it be screen clippings, sidenotes, balloons, citations or envelopes. I'd rather stick with the practical things that I need every day then load up my PC with a load of crap that I'll never use in 20 years.

2. Most people haven't

If ever you decide you need to share one of your files and send it to a co-worker or classmate and they haven't upgraded (which they probably haven't and wisely too), they'll find that they won't be able to view or edit the file because the format of 2007 documents are totally different from other versions. And if you want to prevent this, you'll have to specify that you want the file to be saved in the older format.

1. An annoying number of other changes

The "Office Button", the different tab names, the different way of changing zoom. These seem petty now but the minutes that you spend on each of these things slowly add up and add up.

Food, Food and Food: Foodbuzz

2009-03-16T14:13:00.004-04:00

Although not recognized as a real competitor to more prominent sites like Yahoo! Food or the Food Network's homepage, Foodbuzz is sure to start making some buzz. Basically, the unique facet of this site is its reliance on user sharing to stimulate the community. In other words, it's literally a Facebook of ... food. A lovely design coupled with powerful features make for a pretty good resource when you're cooking for the next party or looking for a nice restaurant.
With over a thousand "foodies", you'll find the best reviews, photos, recipes, blog posts, videos and more all categorized and searchable so you can easily find them. But one really cool twist is the buzz counter where views, comments, favoritings and votes are factored in to create a score that allows the best content to appear first, all decided by users.
Plus, you've got all sorts of other little features that'll help you tremendously in finding the perfect piece of content for your food situation. Filter by location (useful for finding restaurants), type of post, buzz count or date.
And with all this rich variety of features, you can look for anything that can be posted (reviews, photos, recipes, blog posts and videos) as well as restaurants, specific users and products, each with specialized search bars that let you input particulars on any of these items (price, cuisine, ingredients etc.).
Of course, this isn't a community for just professionals; it's suited for anyone and anyone can post their knowledge and opinions. You can communicate with your "friends" with an mail feature and set a wide range of preferences if you create a free account.

www.foodbuzz.com

5 iPhone Apps We All Wish Existed

2009-03-15T11:51:00.004-04:00

5. HaHaHa!

Touch the screen and the iPhone will over-emphatically announce, "Ha ha, you don't have an iPhone!" Customizable voices go as annoying as Sarah Palin.

4. I Hate Windows Switch

Connect to any PC installed with Windows and whenever frustrated, simply touch a button on your iPhone and flash a suicide message and shut down dramatically.

3. FixUrBoss

Insert an identification code for boss's computer's and as long as you're within 30 feet of his computer, he'll see Steve Urkel heads randomly pop up on his screen.

2. Dumb as a Bush

Turns microphone on and analyzes any conversations for appropriate places to blare out a stupid George Bush quote.

1. ObamaTrack

Tells you the distance between you and Barack Obama, the most direct route to him, predicts his next moves and gives you a comprehensive guide on being an Obama Fanboy, updated daily.

Eight Generation Video Game Consoles: The Next Line of High-Tech Games

2009-03-14T15:31:00.003-04:00

By the time the next decade rolls around in about a year, discussion about the eighth generation of video game consoles will begin to heat up. However, these days, nobody really cares, mesmerized by their current systems and their advancements. Wii's motion control, Xbox's online experience and Playstation's hi-definition gaming are all pretty cool. Still, there are definitely improvements that can be made to each of these in their successors (the Wii 2, Xbox Next and Playstation 4 respectively).

Wii

Make the motion control more accurate

I rarely play my Wii but I vaguely recall playing Wii Golf on the Wii Sports disc. And let me summarize in two words: It sucked! The character would simply refuse to react to any motions while putting was almost impossible as the power was almost always distorted.

Improve games

The variety is fine but the ones that are out there are not quality games. They're basically a bunch of mini-game packs. In other words, make a few non-kiddish games that hardcore gamers would like. The gameplay is good on Wii but the other smaller features are horrendous.

Improve graphics

The Wii's unacceptable graphics pale in comparison to that of the Xbox and PS3. In fact, this is one of the main reasons people are straying away from this system.

Improve online experience

Some people might ask me, "How can you improve the online experience if there's none to talk about?" Ok, this is stretching it just a little bit. Wii does support online capability but just barely. There's no chat feature, community lobby/homepage, any downloadable content other than "channels" and it's agonizingly slow.

Xbox

Reduce number of errors

The notorious red rings of fire phase was enough to make any gamer impatient so the NextBox better be virtually error-free or the gaming world is bound to turn on them.

Increase PC connectability

The PC connectability was definitely not lacking in the 360 but it can be improved. I can see somewhere along the road, from the Xbox, you would be able to access and edit Word, Powerpoint, Excel and Publisher files or perhaps even PDFs. Being able to change some of the computer settings would be nice too although this may raise some security issues.

Do not implement motion control

Motion control will surely crapitize the amazing game line-up that the Xbox features. Developing for motion controls is much harder to do than developing for buttons and thus the neat features of the current Xbox games would be excluded. This would kill the Xbox.

Playstation

Lower the price

I'll say one thing. The starting price of the PS4 can't be $800 or even $500; $400 is pretty much a maximum, especially if this economic downturn continues. I'd say the price was the one biggest turn-off of the PS3 at launch and Sony can't afford for it to happen again.

Increase game line-up, introducing new games and expanding current franchises

The PS3's games aren't spectacular although they definitely trump Wii's. They absolutely need improvement though as hyped games did not exactly turn out while non-hyped ones didn't either. Do see the dilemma here?

Remove the motion control

The "Six-Axis" motion control in the PS3 was simply a load of crap; if you're not going to do it right, why do it at all? This screwed up the games quite a bit and was totally pointless.

Improve the Playstation Network

Sony will have to think outside the box a little bit for their next PSN update. The Playstation Network is currently mediocre. It's better than the Wii's but not as good as the Xbox's. However, PSN actually has a lot of features that Xbox Live has but just does not have that special touch.

Preventing Social Network Mind Control: 11 Ways to Spend Less Time on Facebook

2009-03-14T10:14:00.007-04:00

Facebook. Everybody knows about it. Just about everybody has an account. And at least a third of these people are passionate enough to be called addicted. The world of social networking is a harsh place and Facebook is its biggest (and most corrupting) player. Don't get me wrong, Facebook is great but so is fitness, intelligence and experience. Here's how to spend less time on the most popular social network:

11. Don't go on the computer as much.

This is probably the best way to stop going Facebook. However, these days, most people can't spare precious computer time so this isn't exactly the most practical thing to do. Still, if you can cut down, do it; it saves electricity, time, your eyes and your body.

10. Eliminate useless notes.

Trust me, I've seen tons and tons of these "What's your stupidness percentage?" or "How Asian are you?" notes that seem to be gaining in popularity among teenagers. I'm just here to inform you that these are not "cool" and no matter how intensely bored you are, this is still hugely, immensely, vastly stupid.

9. Don't add friends that you don't actually know.

OK, I know it's fun having a guy who poses as your favorite baseball player as your friend but searching for these losers on Facebook just to feel all warm and fuzzy inside is lame and again stupid. Also, if somebody decides they want to start adding random people as friends and you're one of the victims, ignore, ignore, ignore. But that's not all; even if you know somebody's name, but don't really have connections with them, don't add them. 200 friends on Facebook isn't a symbol of popularity, it's a symbol of nerdiness.

8. Delete stupid applications.

You probably know what I'm talking about. Or to give you a better idea, I'll list a few examples: Sports Bets (no practically real prizes), Friends for Sale (totally and utterly gay), Mob Wars (reaches a new level of geeky homosexuality) and Bowling Buddies (social network, not games, social network, not games: repeat this until you get it). In other words, think of Facebook as a utility not a site for personal amusement.

7. Find alternatives to Facebook tools.

Sure, there are some good apps out there but every single one has its actually social counterpart. Half the time, you can just call your friends to tell them something (events, school stuff etc.) and for the movie, tv and restaurant reviews, small talk will give you a good idea of what's hot and what's not.
On the other hand, if you can't find something you like, you're bound to come across other websites that host similar services or tools. This will prevent you from getting attracted to other parts of Facebook from a particular application.

6. No email notifications.

Period. Put your foot down and say, "I don't want any more Facebook spam." Updates on every single comment and note and request are pointless and you can waste 5 minutes just deleting all of them while reading them would take a good hour.

5. Go offline.

This is really simple and can help a lot with getting over email addictions too. Going offline blocks anybody from intruding into what you're doing with a craving for company and tells people that if they send you a message you're not responding any time soon so they might not send you a message in the first place and then you have an excuse to not respond.

4. You don't have to share everything.

This is one of the underlying principles in Facebook reduction. If it's not a legitimately good photo, don't post it; if it's not a legitimately good video, don't post it; if it's not a useful piece of information, don't post it; if has no advantages for you or for others, don't post it.

3. Avoid joining groups/causes/events/whatever the hell else just because one of your Friends invited you.

Fitting in is great but fitting in on Facebook is nerdy. I'll make that plain as hell. Plus, if somebody pressures you into joining, "Take off your pants day" or the group "I go slightly out of my way to step on that crunchy looking leaf" consider breaking your connections.

2. Make a Facebook schedule.

I've never liked to go this far but if you are clinically addicted to the point where you're always on, maybe you want to give this a try. Maybe your schedule will be, come home, have a snack, check email for 5 minutes, check Facebook for 10 minutes and do work. But beware: Your schedule should not (excuse me, cannot) include checking for notifications every 5 minutes.

1. Do something.

Life is beautiful. Facebook isn't. There's tons of stuff that you can do other than Facebook all day (yes, it is a verb now). Bring out the ambitious side of you and by ambitious I don't mean creating a new group or event; I mean starting a fundraising effort, running a marathon or heck, starting a company (ok, maybe not).

Google Calendar vs. Yahoo Calendar: The Event Organization Wars

2009-03-10T18:17:00.005-04:00

Prettiness:

These days, it's been established as a general rule that Google's sites look better than Yahoo!'s. Yahoo!'s are almost always, hard on the eyes with poor choice of fonts and bad colour integration and really pathetic attempts to look modern while Google's web pages appear natural and very modern. This doesn't change in the calendar service battle.

Google: 1 Yahoo!: 0

Features:

Yahoo! doesn't really help its cause in this department. Sure, it has the somewhat (ok, very) uncreative stock tracker, weather and sports tracker but there's really nothing else that it can brag about that Google doesn't have. Contrarily, the competitor supports mobile access, public calendar sharing as well as viewing.

Google: 2 Yahoo!: 0

Convenience:

Another well-established rule on the internet today is that Google is always more convenient than Yahoo!. However, Yahoo! apparently is trying to squeeze in a little rebuttal with their calendar service. While Google's version gets extremely frustrating with their drag concept, huge time bars and the need to scroll to view the entire day, Yahoo! has a list of events and tasks at your fingertips and shows everything at a glance.

Google: 2 Yahoo!: 1

Simplicity/"Understandablity":

Google usually somehow finds the perfect balance of feature-richness and simplicity but not this time. The calendar has way too many buttons that confuse users and again, the drag concept is downright stupid. And the whole fanciness thing starts to turn against them as some thing just get confusing.
Yahoo! though, has a no-nonsense service with a much simpler "Quick Add Event" bar, a simpler way to add events and a moderate number of details that can be specified.

Google: 2 Yahoo!: 2

Sharing:

Both internet companies did a good job in some areas of this. Google allows users to make public calendars that others can view but it seems these days that there is an overload of inaccurate or unmaintained public calendars that some fall into the trap of putting onto their personal calendar. Yahoo! specialises in individual sharing with a very easy way to share calendars with a single person or small groups: All you have to do is send them to a web page (http://calendar.yahoo.com/*username*) and enable sharing. You can also collaborate with them on these calendars with those with the label of "Special Friend" permitted to edit your calendars. With Yahoo!, you can make your calendars totally public too but this feature is not as good as Google's.

Google: 2 Yahoo!: 3

Verdict:

Yahoo!'s ease of use trumps Google's potential masterpiece of features. Too bad they didn't execute.

Health Still Matters: Count Calories with Calorie Lab

2009-03-10T17:43:00.004-04:00

As one of PC Magazine's top 10 sites of 2008 and a FoodBuzz featured publisher, CalorieLab is definitely one of the few web pages that you can trust the condition of your body to.
Not only does this site have the nutrition facts of numerous generic foods (e.g. apples, fries, candy bars) but it also supplies comprehensive guides to exact nutrition counts of many dishes from pretty much every restaurant chain you'll ever come across, all categorized neatly. So next you go to KFC for example, you'll know that the KFC Chicken Snacker has 320 calories, with 16 grams of fat and 14 grams of protein. There's also a decent list detailing the nutrition facts of some particular brand names. A search bar to find specific restaurants and foods exists as well to help you with navigation.
But how could this site do without a count of calories burned by activities? Of course, this is included too; simply enter your weight, an activity name and you'll be on your way to finding exactly what you need to do to lose a few pounds.
However, if you want professionals to mold your diet for you totally, you'll find instructions to applying everything from the cookie diet, to the maple syrup diet. Experts looking at supplements, weight loss services and diet book reviews are also packed in.
Although I don't quite see what there is to report, another section of CalorieLab is devoted to "Calorie Counter News", basically just more guides to fitness, I guess.
On the other hand, I can't say that everything's flawless; one huge hole in this site is the fact that less prominent foods and eateries don't have many of the nutrition facts filled in. Instead, you'll simple see a gloomy grey N/A or a vague estimate (maybe <500 calories).
Still, it's free and it's absolutely a good investment of a few minutes every week.

calorielab.com/index.html

Time Magazine's Terrible Treason: The Story of How One of the World's Biggest Magazine's Abandoned its Subscribers

2009-02-02T18:16:00.003-05:00

I'd always been intrigued by Time's insightful articles and I'll give them credit. Their writers are great and always will be great. And that's why I decided it'd be cool to subscribe to the publication and so spent $30 (Canadian dollars) on a year's subscription.
So quickly, they sent me the first issue, which happened to be the Barack Obama Time Person of the Year Issue. I was very satisfied by the content and the service; it was in perfect condition and everything was great ... at the time that is.
After this, I thought I knew my next issue would come on January 19th but that day passed without any sign of a Time Magazine coming any time soon. But I decided that I was so satisfied with the first issue that I didn't care; I'd just wait another week to see if I'd get anything (despite the fact that it's a news magazine and many of the stories' validity and interest quickly expire). However, I waited another week, and nothing came, and another. In fact, I've been waiting until now, more than 4 weeks, and still nothing has come. And you bet that's frustrating because in these tough economical times, you want everything for your dollar and I wasn't getting anything for my hard 30.
Thus, I did the only sensible thing I could and decided I would investigate. So I went to the site (which by the way they had no Canadian version of) and tried to enter my account number, which I had to use to contact them. But somehow, it seemed that all of my account information had been erased from the Time database because, even after continuously trying to get into my account, they refused to grant me entry. And so I called them. But it turned out that the provided phone number could not be called from Canada.
After looking around for awhile though, I came across a little text (maybe font size 6, and grey to boot): It said that there was a specific place to enter account info for Canadians. I clicked and here's where it took me. In case you didn't click, here's the message I was shown:

TIME will no longer be publishing a Canadian advertiser edition. The final issue of TIME Canada is the December 29, 2008 issue.
An official notification will be sent in the next 2-3 weeks. If you have any questions, please call customer service at 1-800 843-8463.

You might spot the phone number at the end, which is what I called to inquire about this. And what I got was a long waiting process followed by a totally unhelpful answerer who just assertively backed this message. So I basically won't get 6 or 7 Time Magazine issues. There cheating me out of 5 bucks. It sounds petty but that's not the point; you wouldn't be happy either if you were denied of your only source of informational entertainment for 2 months.

So thanks Time, for spitting on all of the loyal Canadian subscribers out there.

Why We Spend Hours on MSN Chatting

2009-01-26T20:47:00.004-05:00

As they watch impatiently as their children are overwhelmed by a flood of instant messages and respond to each one of them with a slight smile on their face, parents wonder, "Why the hell can't they just talk on the phone?" Well, that's when the psychology kicks in; adolescent minds work very differently from those of adults. Here's the chatting phenomenon explained:

6. People feel under pressure to say something constantly on the phone but can do other things on the computer

The fact is that people don't feel uncomfortable not saying anything for half an hour while in a chat because they know that their fellow chatter is aware that they are doing something else. On the other hand, not saying something for more than five seconds counts as an awkward silence and with the number of awkward things these days, who needs another.

5. We're usually on the computer anyway

Hey, it's true. This generation is starting to use the computer more and more as it becomes more and more "useful". So I guess we're just getting so lazy that we can't walk a few steps to pick up a phone; instead, we just want to sit in our chairs, typing and staring, typing and staring.

4. People feel more comfortable expressing themselves with IMs than with long speeches

Maybe long speeches were trendy back in the 80s but they definitely aren't now. Plus, some feel like they're revealing more when they're talking face to face or even just on the phone but they feel more secure hiding behind their trusty e-wall.

3. Most are more fluent in writing than talking

When you speak, you can pause for a minute thinking of how to word something; you just have to go ahead and unless you're a really good talker, you'll get mixed up with what you're trying to say. On the other hand, on the computer, you can take your own sweet time thinking of something to say and then how to say it.

2. You can mask your true personality and reactions with simple cyber-surgery

Thoughts can quickly be translated to speech so a conversation can quickly turn sour if you can't hide your emotions. However, in a chat, you don't see thoughts or hear words, you watch letters slowly appear on the screen. And who says these letters have to be truly showing what you think; in fact, you can be a whole different person online.

1. Because everyone else does

What's popular is what's popular and people can't resist following the trends. Almost everone has an Windows Messenger account and if you don't, you're pretty much seen as an outsider. To add to that, if you're not on every hour of every day, you're seen as an outsider too.

More Than Just Games: Playstation Portable

2009-01-26T20:24:00.003-05:00

I'd been wanting a Playstation Portable, better known as the PSP, for months and finally, a month ago I got it. And now, I only have raves about its spectacular features.
Well, for starters, this is a gaming device and boy can it game. The graphics are absolutely amazing for a handheld device and the screen is remarkably large allowing for the most advanced gameplay that you'll never see on Gameboys. And of course, the games on the PSP are not stupid collections of mini-games that you get bored of after a few weeks but real, hardcore games that include Grand Theft Auto, MLB 08: The Show, Shaun White Snowboarding, God of War, Rainbow Six Vegas and many more excellent titles.
Of course, the PSP isn't just about games and in fact, Sony totally re-defines the rules of the handheld with their device, which can also act as an MP3 player, a photo viewer and a movie player. Plus, as long as you establish a connection point, the PSP can be a web browser as well. And with this, you don't just get a handful of sites that actually work; in fact, it's tough to find one that isn't supported by the PSP's Javascript-friendly browser. And with internet, there's Skype, internet radios and customizable RSS feeds that are pre-installed onto your system and online gameplay too.
But that's not all; there's tons of little extras that you won't find anywhere else. For example, the PSP comes in several different actually stylish colors (not just black, white and pink) that can make gamer nerds look cool. Moreover, you can download PSP themes that range from Windows Vista backgrounds to Christmas looks. Further, this little device has a USB slot, a headphone jack, a memory stick slot and slots for other things that I don't even know about. To back it all up though, you can customize almost anything on your PSP.
So think about it. What's a barely functional touch screen compared to the PSP's multimedia capabilities and top-quality games. Well, not much.

Why Blogging and Everything About the Blogosphere Sucks

2009-01-25T20:54:00.006-05:00

Back in 2003, which now seems like centuries ago, blogs were a new and very innovative idea. The blogosphere was fresh and untainted, and everyone loved this absurd but cool idea. However, shiny became dull and now blogging is in trend but that's pretty much what defeats the purpose. The glory days have faded.
One main reason is that back in the day, if you wrote an interesting blog post, your page would be sure to surge to some of the top rankings in search engines and attract tons of traffic. But today, it's almost impossible for an amateur blogger who simply writes as a pastime to obtain a decent search engine ranking. Instead, the Wikipedias and CNNs of the world have taken over because they are considered "reliable sources". Sure, they have the facts but what happened to all the excitement to read cold, hard opinion and spirit. But if you are enthusiastic enough about blogging, you might try some stupid little tricks like search engine optimization, social networking and whatever the hell else but ordinary people don't have the time to do these things. They have to work, make a living and pay the bills.
On the other hand, big corporations and major "professional" blogs have the time, money and ability to do all these things. Now, smaller blogs don't have any chance of squeezing through the thick canopy of those Engadgets, Huffington Posts, Gizmodos and DailyKos, which by the way each have writers who are just plain writers. They don't have any jobs, so they don't know how real people feel. They're essentially robots. There's no more clever thought and hearty authenticism in the world of blogs; there's only the companies' paid arsenal of jounalistists.
And now, apparently they're re-making the rules of the blog: Zap all life out, write with apathy, don't write with emotion and don't you dare write as if you were directing each word at readers individually. Impersonal is the key to the kingdom now. Just look at all the lists of the top blogs; sure you might find the outlying personal blog, but then the other 98% are basically just online newspapers.
Plus, now you don't just have to compete with your fellow bloggers for readers but with other webbies who share videos on Youtube, share photos on Flickr and share personal information on Facebook.
So to try and do everything to get to that elusive 10-visitor per day mark, bloggers are now making an effort to be like the "professionals". Blog about the elections. Blog about Google. Blog about the stock market. It's all so overwhelming and irritating. The evil organization of writers is guiding the entire blogosphere into a bottomless pit of boring, boring crap.
So, this is all you get for spending many of your valuable hours pumping out posts? I could think of about a billion other things to do that are much more rewarding and satisfying.
All in all, people are asking a lot of you to show off your wit to compete with the likes of The New York Times, Time Magazine and Michelle Malkin. But I guess I'll stay in this garbage dump disguised as paradise ... for now.

Your Guide to Being the Next Google: 9 Things that Google Does Better Than Anyone Else

2009-01-22T17:21:00.006-05:00

9. Always aesthetic design

It's never cluttered or hard on the eye. You may notice that each Google page is based on achieving an appealing design by focusing not on how awesome everything looks but just beauty by simpicity.

8. Free is not bad

It's tough to name more than a few Google services that require you to give up a dime, which is particularly helpful in these tough economical times. In fact, rarely does Google even offer you a upgraded version that you must pay for, which often gives users a sense that this company is more credible.

7. The cool factor

Steve Jobs and his company, Apple, are cool factor masterminds with their line of iPods and the revolutionary iPod. However, Google is definitely a contender with many features that basically are meant not so much for useful application but just to entice people into trying something out. For instance, all of their unique search features make people "wow" every time and their extensive news archives are always alluring.

6. Publicity

If you think about it, there's a lot Google does to get into the media. Whether it's introducing a new feature (however small) or hitting the top 100 best employers list, people will always find ways to read about Google. Bloggers will keep posting, newspapers will keep publishing and TV stations will keep broadcasting everything that happens with this internet giant. And sometimes, indeed, there is no such thing as bad publicity, especially for a website.

5. Put things in a good light

Some will never realize that them constantly typing feedback to Google or telling others their "Google stories" is only part of Google's plan. They make you think that you'll benefit from something or they're doing everyone a favor when really, the only thing happening is that Google is earning some major cha-ching. And note how all the words, colors, fonts etc. always appear to be positive. There's never a negative message out in the open so as not to discourage use of services.

4. Accomodate the user

If you asked someone on the street what they liked about Google, a great number of them would probably say that everything they want is right there for them on Google. This is because Google knows users inside and out and know exactly what their complaints are and even understand the most trivial of issues.

3. Attention to detail

Before something is put on their site, Google ensures that it is totally flawless. No typos, no coding errors, no anything errors. And again, they always pay full attention to what users want and deliver this to them.

2. Fill the gaps

Instead of focusing on things where competition is thriving and everywhere, Google focuses on markets where they know that they can be dominant. Google doesn't have Google Sports (they know Sports Illustrated is already there); Google doesn't have Google Music (they know MTV is already there); and Google doesn't have Google Movies (they know IMDB is already there). Instead, they have a collection of all the other stuff from Google Documents to Google Code to Google Scholar, which have not been explored by many others. Likewise, with the essentials, Google adds never-before-seen features to enhance their users' experience by just that little bit that gives them the edge.

1. Simplicity

All Google services are easy to use and pretty much can be quickly comprehended by anyone. Each little nook and cranny is so apparent and nothing is hidden. Their titles, labels and graphics are so incredibly idiot-proof that some even get embarassed if they can't understand a Google product. Plus, even if you do have trouble with something, you can always consult their help pages, which are comprehensive and have a quality that's unheard of.

These don't seem like much but I guess doing your homework a bit goes a long way. Good luck, Yahoo! on beating Google with it's massive arsenal of weapons.

Top 15 Best and Most Useful Facebook Applications

2009-01-08T18:41:00.008-05:00

Facebook is arguably the most popular social network in the world right now and the entire website is based on the humble application. Applications are either user-generated or native-Facebook web programs (no downloads) that allow users to do such things as share favorite music, write notes, and compare people. Here are the 20 best user-generated applications:

15. Profile HTML

Get funky with your profile! Add some HTML to really spice it up possibly adding links to your websites, or other promotional banners.

14. Restaurants

This applications has a massive list of restaurants from around the world, complete with a few important details and reviews and ratings. This is your one stop shop for guidance for eating out.

13. tvClickr

Here's another review oriented application, which features a type of forum for comments on almost any show as well as a short summary and even a few videos. The main thing about this app though is the fact that you can participate in games to earn credits that allow you to participate in contests, all tv-related of course.

12. Movies

This application is the ultimate movie guide where you can quickly rate movies you've seen, compile a list of movies you want to see, watch trailers, find movies that are in theatres and even compare your preferences with friends.

11. iLike

Here's the music version of the previous one. This is very well-designed and lets you find concert dates, rate artists, songs and videos and finally show off all your likes and dislikes. Of course, quite a bit of music information is provided too.

10. Causes

With this innovative application, users can donate money to different causes, all categorized into groups such as animals, environment and political campaigns. As well, you can create your own causes to raise money.

9. StyleFeeder

With this application, you can tell the whole world about how you shop; what clothes, furniture, CDs or whatever you like. Then, theres coupons, suggestions of thing you might like and available friends' preferences to see what the trends are these days.

8. weRead

Now you have an excuse to get Facebook. Tell your parents about weRead, which features everything books. And when I say everything I mean everything including top authors, top books, top searched books, new releases and user-made book reviews. Plus, you can add books to your personal library to really keep track of what you're reading.

7. NHL Scores & News/NFL Scores & News/NBA Scores & News/MLB Scores & News etc.

If you're a sports fan, you won't be able to live without this. Many applications are here to serve your needs and provide news, analysis and most importantly scores that are updated daily to feed your constant sports craving.

6. Stocks

With the application made by Forbes, you can track all of your stocks right from your favorite social network. Find news, earnings and even friends' portfolios right from this nifty little thing.

5. Study Groups

Create well... you may have guessed it, study groups. Instead of going to the library to study with friends and classmates, just use everyone's favorite social network, Facebook. Basically, you can create study groups for others to join and join other study groups.

4. My Blogs

This application publishes a post on your wall whenever you write something on your blog. Just give them the URL of either the blog or the RSS feed and they'll handle it from there.

3. Captain Resume

This is really an amazing application and I'll bet that in many lists this would be first. With the state of the economy and the number of job losses, there's been a lot of talk lately about promoting yourself using the internet. This lets you do just that allowing you to upload your resume, edit tags and proudly display it on your Facebook profile.

2. ProductPulse

With excellent interface and very simple controls, ProductPulse is a very well-designed application. But that's not all, you can share reviews to maybe praise a good product or let off steam about a bad one. And of course, you can read reviews and ratings that others have given to things before you go out and buy them.

1. Social Calendar

The main feature of this app is to remember all the "social events" in your life, whether it be birthdays, holidays or other occasions. But you can do a lot more as well; Add wishlists, see movie calendars and give gifts to friends.

Honorable Mention:

Launch-a-Package

This application is both extremely well-designed and very useful and innovative. The main idea is to let users send virtual packages to friends enclosed with a message, a link, photos, gifts and even files. And of course, if the message is private, then you don't have to have the story published in your profile.

If You're Thinking of Buying an MP3 Player or iPod, Just Remember Sandisk Sansa Sucks

2009-01-08T18:00:00.001-05:00

Let's face the facts; in terms of initial quality of MP3 players, Apple's ingenious innovation, the iPod leads the way with the ever unpopular Microsoft Zune not that far behind. Then, there's the other guys. It seems these days that everyone is trying to obtain some type of a share of the MP3 player/song/accessory/whatever-the-hell-else market with Sony's Walkman series, Creative's Zen series, Samsung's YP series or- Sandisk's Sansa Series.
How about another cold hard fact: Sandisk Sansa sucks (SSS). I'll give it to you that this device looks very good for its relatively low device but here's why you'll be making a major mistake if you buy one of these.
First of all, you must understand that the website (which, by the way, has some pretty good design) totally distorts how these players look. The web designer nerds actually have some design sense and make the Sansas appear very sleek and cool and iPodish if you will. And just on a sidenote, Sansas are no substitute for the all-mighty iPod; Sansas are not trendy, cool, popular or for that matter good.
To add, the scrollwheel on many of these devices aren't even touch-based and therefore, the flimsy little wheels are very undurable and currently my Sansas scrollwheel and hence total navigation system is experiencing major difficulties.
Also, all of the Sandisk players lack features in a major, major way; in fact, so much so that a few of the main features of their best MP3 are a built-in microphone and video capabilities (no wi-fi, touch screen or event organizer to boast, just a 2.4" screen and a 30-day trial of Rhapsody).
Moreover, virtually every part of the Sansa that I have is intensely faulty and error-filled. Just a few right off the top of my head include random files showing up; an inability to upload new files even though it wasn't even halfway to full capacity; several freezings where I was unable to do anything for about 10 minutes; an unbelievably slow interface where when I press something, it actually has to load for a while; and an inability to show photos although they are on the player and photo-viewing was supposed to be a feature.
Oh yeah, the last thing I have to say is that the battery life of Sansas absolutely suck. The advertisements claim long battery lives but mine barely lasts 5 or 6 hours (only music playback) and I've only had for about a year. The Sansa View's product page says that it has 32 hours of battery life but even though I don't have this player, but I already know that it will only possibly have maybe 15hours.
So all in all, with what I'm seeing with Sansa, I'd just recommend Sandisk to stay with USBs and memory cards, things that they can actually make.

8 Economical Things to do with Your Kids Outdoors Over the Winter Holidays

2008-12-23T12:47:00.007-05:00

8. Photography: FREE (if you own a camera)

Ok, this is a more adult-oriented activity but you can definitely get your children into this art by taking them into a little forest or ravine and letting them take a few shots. And winter offers some of the most magnificent photos of the year.

7. Ice fishing: $20

This isn't exactly the kiddiest thing to do either but it's always fun for them exploring new areas and the first fish they catch will be a pretty satisfying experience. Just obtain a license and go to any nearby lake (or even pond) and you'll be off and running.

6. Making snowmen and other snow sculptures: FREE

This can be done right in your front yard or at any nearby park and the great thing about this is that it's very flexible; you can make pretty much anything so it's suitable for all ages.

5. Tobogganing: FREE

You don't have the control of when you're skiing but there still is the thrill of going down a hill pretty fast. But you can make up for the lost control by constructing little ramps to add an extra bit of excitement to the equation. But watch out for any dangers such as trees and roads because most tobogganing spots aren't monitored.

4. Snowshoeing: $15

Anyone who can walk can go snowshoeing so it's very easy to learn. Moreover, snowshoeing is excellent exercise for both adults and kids and can be a great social group activity.

3. Snowball fights: FREE

Nothing could be more rewarding than hitting somebody in the face with a watery snowball. Now don't be put off by this physical element; snowball fights might hurt a bit at times but aren't going to cause any major injuries.

2. Skating: $0-$5

Trying to get through hoards of people at the malls is nothing compared to whipping through them on skates at the ice rink. Just like snowshoeing, ice skating is good exercise and is an amazing social group activity but is just a lot faster.

1. Skiing: $40/person

Swerving down the double black diamond at incredibly high speeds with the biting wind gusting past you can't be beaten (that's why it's number 1). Ok, maybe that's a bit extreme; maybe the blue or bunny hills would be more suitable but whatever you choose the feeling you get when you're skiing is always good.

9 Essential Parts to a Perfect Christmas Party: The Last Four Aspects

2008-12-22T10:00:00.002-05:00

For the first five aspects, go here.

4. Great social aspect

There is no such thing as a silent party and for good reason; a party is not a party without the volume turned to max with conversation, music and everything else. To achieve this, one tip is to invite more people because the more people, the more talking and the more talking, the more enjoyment. And if none of the guests are taking the initiative to become the life of the party, you, the host, should, to suck out any remaining wallflower left in anybody.

3. Planning

You should be ready for basically anything to happen. You should be ready for the people who like movies with a few DVDs; you should be ready for the gamers in the crowd with a bunch of video games; you should be ready for the dancers with some music and a disco ball; and you should be ready for the drinkers with a few cases of beer.

2. The spirit of giving

Invoke this spirit by setting an example, giving up the last slice of pizza or a few minutes of your day to pick someone up. Give up your parking space and even a bit of money for one of the guests to buy something they really need. As well, you can host a little bit of a gift exchange where each person is assigned another person to buy a gift for and everybody gives and receives something.

1. Christmas feel

A Christmas feel can be added to a party in many different ways. For instance, decorations should be plentiful- Christmas trees and lights are musts and lighting the fireplace can really put in some Christmasness-, you can add a bit of red and green to your food, and having your guests dress in Christmassy clothes can do a lot as too.

9 Essential Parts to a Perfect Christmas Party: The First Five Aspects

2008-12-21T15:36:00.003-05:00

9. Cleanliness

Although it is true that by the end of the party, your place will likely be about 5 times as messy as it was before, you should definitely take a day, preferably the day before the party, to clean. This is simply because nobody wants to attend a party in an old shack of a place. Do a little sweeping, swiffering/mopping, dusting, wiping and possibly vacuuming to put your house into a good condition.

8. Not too crazy

You absolutely want to have as much fun as possible but you don't want to get carried away. A police visit and a few fines or arrests will ruin anybody's holiday spirit and will take away all the life in your party, that is if it is even allowed to carry on. One thing you should think about is how much alcohol you're allowing guests to have; limit this to limit craziness. Lastly, tell your buds to turn their down their music and break any fights up to ensure that your party doesn't run into trouble.

7. No hurt feelings

You may be saying to yourself, "What? Why do we have to worry about that, nobody starts being a thug at a Christmas party." But you may not see it on the outside but at those teenage Truth or Dare, Spin the Bottle parties, feelings are hurt way too much. So try to lay off of the crude humour and offensive jokes for a day because Christmas is supposed to be all about peace and generosity.

6. Enough entertainment for everybody

Nobody enjoys a party where they're just standing around doing nothing half the time. Thus, you've got to have plenty of different things to do whether it's watching a hockey game, playing an Xbox, playing poker or just revelling in a nice board game. A party where everybody's just standing around with a beer, making small talk gets really boring.

5. A bit of organization

I'm not telling you to make your whole party "you have to do this, you have to do that," but there should be a few group activities that you know pretty much everyone will find fun. Also, you should, without doubt, set a loose schedule of what should happen when, detailed with the arrival time, meal times, and activity times.

For the last four aspects, come back tomorrow. Remember, these ones will be the most crucial to a successful party.

Vote For Your "Useful Crap Person of the Year" for 2008

2008-12-21T11:10:00.004-05:00

Technology has always been a focus for me in this blog and I'm going to take it to the next level with the "Useful Crap Person of the Year". Vote for who, in the technology world, you think has been made the biggest difference or contribution this year. Is it Steve Jobs with the new wave of next-gen devices at Apple or Mark Zuckerberg with his advances in social networking at Facebook? Could it be somebody else?
You decide; you've got 'til December 31, 2008 to choose. Just leave a comment on who it is and possibly a little explanation when you've selected.

Christmas Feature: Affordable Gifts You Can Give To A Teenage Girl

2008-12-19T20:08:00.006-05:00

Teenage girls' tastes aren't exactly the most flexible things in the world and they have very specific and very unique wishlists every year. But here's a few items that virtually any of them will like:

Nikon Coolpix Digital Camera

An 8 megapixel Nikon Coolpix is very sleek and can be handy for teenagers at any party or trip with friends. Let them capture memories and post these on each of their 24 Facebook accounts.

Perfume

This is just one of the hygenic products that are pretty much essential for any girl so why not a pack of perfume. I'm not really the expert in this area so I'll just let you decide which brand you want to buy.

Aeropostale Gift Card

I'll rave on about Aeropostale; it's popular, good-quality and not too expensive. And you can't go wrong with a gift card because you know how picky girls can be about clothing.

Lululemon Gift Card

Here's another pretty trendy clothing brand that's is really beginning to rise. Lululemon "produces yoga-inspired athletic apparel", which sounds quite lame but don't worry, they're bound to find a few garments they like in Lululemon.

Music CD

Music CDs are still in and every girl wants the new Britney Spears, Katy Perry or Rihanna album. As with the guys, you should know the music tastes of the person you're going to give this to.

iPod

I didn't put a specific type of iPod because they're all very popular and everybody needs one of these to store their 100 hours of music. The newest iPod Nano has some pretty cool features but the iPod Touch still is obviously the most advanced iPod.

Cellphone

I would never want one of these but then again I'm not a girl. A cellphoen can be a great gift for any teenage girl because of their amazing versatility: They can be employed as media players, phones, cameras and internet browsers.

A Book

If you've even glanced at the news recently, you'll probably be aware of how massively in books are, especially with teenage girls. The Twilight series, Chicken Soup series as well as many other publications directed at this demographic will be well-appreciated.

iTunes Music Card

To go along with an iPod, you could give her an iTunes Music Card so she can download all her favorite MP3s from the ever-popular iTunes Store, which by the way also features videos, movies and podcasts.

Christmas Feature: Affordable Gifts You Can Give To A Teenage Boy

2008-12-19T18:55:00.004-05:00

I'm not going to be vague at all with this; I'm just going to take this topic right on. I'll give you the item and I'll give you the brand and I guarantee you that virtually any teenage boy will appreciate at least a few of these things. And by the way, this is coming from a teenage boy.

Xbox 360

Video games have been in since the 90s but they're still just heating up with great new games like Grand Theft Auto IV and Gears of War 2. And, in my opinion (but apparently not in many other people's), the Xbox 360 is the most advanced and satisfying system for gamers who play more than once a month. The Wii is extremely gimmicky and will get lame after a month and I don't even want to bother explaining how bad the PS3 is.

iPod Touch

Pretty much every teenager has some form of an MP3 player and almost all of them have iPods. Well here's the most advanced one yet featuring internet access, application downloading and a touch screen.

Aeropostale Hoody

Aeropostale specializes in teen clothing and is very trendy right now. Plus, throughout the entire holiday season, this store has been having massive sales of 50-75% off. And don't think clothing as a gift is a bad idea either because it's much easier to select the right hoody than the right electronic.

American Eagle Gift Card

Another highly popular clothing store is American Eagle, which is more expensive than Aeropostale but has a greater variety to choose from. And you can't really go wrong with a gift card, especially one from AE.

Best Buy Gift Card

As electronics get bigger, so do teens' love for them and Best Buy is the nations largest retailer of these. They have pretty much every electronic, from video games to MP3 players to mobile phones.

Sports Illustrated Magazine Subscription

Sports Illustrated is one of the most read magazines in the world and many of their subscribers are quite young. Sports Illustrated pretty much sums up everything happening in the world of sports with interesting articles and statistics as well as many cool photos every week.

Easton Baseball Glove

Baseball is America's favorite pastime and it's not like that changes in the winter (OK, maybe a bit but still). Pretty much every kid in the States has to play baseball whether competitively or recreationally and they all need a quality glove. And Easton's gloves are without doubt the best and just as a heads-up, the Easton Stealth is their top model.

Nike Baseketball Shoes

The Nike Swoosh has become a symbol all across the globe and nothing could be more in than basketball shoes right now. Those two combined really make the ultimate Christmas present.

A Book

Although there is all the other cool stuff, who can forget the humble old book. But don't make it a lame book on how Christopher Columbus found the Americas, make it about a topic that you know they like.

A Music CD

Despite the fact that CDs aren't as hot as they were before, it's nice having an actual item instead of just downloads. Head over to HMV and get something but make sure you know their music tastes inside and out. If they like metal, Chinese Democracy by Guns N' Roses is good while if they like pop rock, Famous Last Words by Hedley is good.

Christmas Feature: 5 Essential Tips to Christmas Shopping

2008-12-19T17:55:00.004-05:00

Christmas is the busiest time in terms of shopping because everybody has to make some type of purchase whether gifts, decorations or food in addition to the everyday essentials that we all need to buy. Thus, you can't just randomly roam around; you have to know what you're doing.
Let me just start you off with a few general shopping tips that can be applied at any time of the year, whether Black Friday, Christmas or Boxing Day:

Top 10 Tips
Top 10 Clothing Shops
Top 10 What Not To Do

Now, for the uniquely Christmas tips:

5. Brand names are important.

Some may not admit it but everyone likes brand names simply because of the popularity (although quality is often better as well). Whether it's shampoo, clothing or coffee, everyone wants the real stuff. And Christmas isn't a time to be pinch pennies; it's a time to show your love and care for people.

4. Hurry in the stores, not on the roads.

I know you're in a rush and I know you have better things to do but for your own safety, don't try cutting through hundreds of cars on your way to the mall to save a few minutes. In the winter especially, it's a hazard because of the slippery, wet conditions as well as the low visibility.

3. Remember to wrap.

Not putting wrapping paper on your gifts makes the recipient feel uncared for so just take a few moments to properly wrap what you give.

2. Shop on weekdays if you can.

The weekends see malls crowded with people each scurrying their own little way, and not caring who they irritate while they do this. On the other hand, weekdays are a lot more peaceful without the stink, heat and crowds of Saturday and Sunday. Parking spots are available and you don't have to worry as much about thieves either.

1. Know what you need.

It's easy to blow a holiday budget and even the most frugal of people can do it. I understand that you want to be a generous as possible but you have to stop at a certain point. So gather all the wishlists, make your own shopping list of things you need to buy for the big party and go armed with these. Inevitably, you're going to spend a bit more but it's always better to have a few guidelines.

One More: Don't be distracted by Christmas displays or events.

There's always going to be Santa Claus visits, special decorations and what not but you have more important things to do. Refrain from strolling around a shopping center examining each little Christmassy item.

Christmas Feature: Easy Decorating for the Holidays

2008-12-17T19:57:00.005-05:00

Make It Themed

Don't simply buy a bunch of random items and place them throughout your house. Instead, use themed decorating and install a sort of feel into your home whether you're going for a snowy feel, a cozy feel or something centered around a specific part of Christmas.
For example, to acheive a white Christmas feel, use transparent Christmas lights, line your tree with white ornaments and even put up a white wreath. Or if you're especially extravagant, you might want to make different parts of the house differently themed.

Remember The Colors

The christmas colours are generally regarded as red, green and possibly white. However, other shades such as brown and orange will definitely work well too. So put around your house, items that feature these colors. And one flawless way to bring out these colors is to dim the lights a bit if you have a dimmer or just turn less on if you don't.

Outdoor Christmas Decor

Christmas Lights

Christmas lights are really an essential thing to have for holiday decorating because they are what's supposed to stand out particularly. You can place these on trees, bushes, walls, roofs or even the ground and don't forget to use the LED types for increased energy efficiency, which will save the environment and your wallet. Christmas lights come in all shapes and sizes and some are even animated to portray a scene.

Wreaths

For the most part, these will be added as door decorations but you can hang them on porch lights or flower hooks as well. You might think that there's not much you can do with these but there are special varieties such as lighted ones and ones made out of other materials. Plus, there are generally small ornaments on wreaths and to go with the them of your house, select the wreath accordin to this ornament.

Other Ones

There are so many different other items that you can utilise to really make your home shine but I'll stick to the most practical ones.

Inflatables

These are basically statues except they are a lot lighter, less expensive and more popular. Inflatables can range from winter scenes or just ones of Santa and the reindeer but they all work extremely well, especially when lit from the inside of them.

Statues

These only really work well in the day when they can be seen unless you have some type of a spotlight to highlight them. You might want to put one of these beside your door or right at the edge of your lawn to greet visitors. Out there are statues of elves, snowmen, reindeer and of course, Santa Claus.

Indoor Christmas Decorations

Christmas Trees

If you don't have a Christmas tree, you pretty much don't have anything, meaning you'd better get one of these by the time December 25th rolls around. Obviously, these are not bare; they are decorated with different ornaments and lights. These should, again, depend on your theme. If your theme is just the normal Christmas theme, then the ornaments and lights you use don't really matter but you absolutely don't want a tree filled only with ball ornaments; put up a variety of different types. Also, if your tree is going to be against a wall, make sure to put your favorite decorations on the front but don't leave the back empty because people are bound to look there some time or another and an empty side is not that appealing.
Lastly, you'll have to make the decision to buy either an artificial tree or a natural one. Obviously, artificial ones can last you a lifetime and are easier to work with but natural ones are always something to brag about.

Fire

The holidays are the one time of year where playing with fire is definitely good for you. Candles are always a nice addition with their scents and colors while fireplaces can be good places to talk around.

Food

This is by far the easiest thing to do as you're essentially killing two birds with one stone. You can eat the food, but first you can put it on display and I don't mean the peas and corn but the pie and gingerbread houses.

Gifts

Stockings and gifts are definitely something to consider. Putting these up just makes the home feel more natural as presents are a part of any Christmas and they don't have to be actually filled either, just wrapped boxes or empty stockings will work.

Tabletop Decor

Those beautiful holiday cards don't have to go to waste as they can just be scattered around the house, acting as extra decorations.
To add, miniature statues or christmas trees can be employed while red and green mugs, plates and bowls can without doubt be easy decorations solutions.

Put It All Together

I can only tell you so much as you just have to figure out yourself how to arrange each of these objects so they fit in with each other and make a perfectly decorated house.