I remember using Netscape in my early days of web surfing. Then came Internet Explorer, but, for Mac users, that didn’t last long. IE development for Macintosh stopped many years back. Along comes Safari, which I never had many problems with as a plain and simple web browser. Shortly after, Firefox entered the web browsing arena. I jumped on board after my boss talked me into downloading it, and haven’t looked back.
Besides being a good, solid web browser, Firefox has many options. Pop up blockers, tab browsing, and higher security features are a few of the cool features listed on switch2firefox.

My favorite thing about the browser though, are the add-ons. Add-ons are tools to make your browsing experience better. They are very easy to install and quickly become an essential part of web browsing.

Firefox Add-ons - is where you’ll find a list of them. Find one you like and click the install button. The add-on will install, and ask you to restart Firefox. After a restart, you’re ready to start using the new add-on.

Some of my favorite add-ons:

FasterFox: A tool that runs in the background that speeds up your web browsing.

FireFtp: If you use an ftp program, this one is built right into the browser, and works pretty well.

StumbleUpon: Allows you to channel surf random websites. Set up your likes preferences, and begin surfing. I find a ton of good sites with this tool.

FoxyTunes: Puts a music player right into your browser, linking to your computers music player.

ForecastFox: Instant weather right from your browser.

These are only a handful of what is out there. Check out the Firefox Add-ons page to browse the hundreds of others. If you find a good one, post it here with a brief description. Enjoy!

At least I can say I tried. I announced a week or so ago, that I was going to switch from Mac to PC. I thought everything would be fine. I loaded all of the necessary software I would need on the machine, and started to use it. I spent a week trying to figure out why the internet was so slow. There are tons of posts on the internet about Vista/Internet speeds, but none of the solutions fixed my problem. My last resort? HP customer service. Here’s how the conversation went:

Me: My HP computer running Vista has an extremly slow connection to a wireless connection.

Support: Well, first things first - did you install any software that WAS NOT Vista compatible? (he explained that installing non-vista software will cause problems with numerous services - one being wireless internet).

Me: Nothing is Vista compatible yet.

Support: Exactly! Uninstall everything, and the computer should run fine.

Me: So, in the mean time, what do I do about the software I need to run?

Support: You’ll have to wait until the software you use comes out with a Vista compatible version.

So, there you have it. Next day I was driving back to the store with the computer boxed up. I had to pay a $130 restock fee, but I guess that’s the price to pay. I went home and did what I should have done in the first place.. Order a shiny new Macbook.

Lesson learned - stick with Macintosh.

Why do I use Gmail.

I gave Gmail a try out of curiosity. I had been previously dabbling in Yahoo mail as well as Hotmail. Both of them were getting huge amounts of spams - and those FWD emails people send you so they can meet their quota to be blessed with good luck. I was ready for something new when I was invited to try Gmail.

I knew I’d like it after the first few email exchanges. I’ll run through a quick list of why I like it, and why I think it’s the best browser based email out there.

- Organization. Gmail keeps conversations in one package. So if you and your friend are replying back and forth with emails, it contains them all. Doesn’t clutter up your email and organizes everything if you need to go back through the conversation.

- RSS my email. Yes, I’m an RSS junky - so I RSS everything. I was thrilled to find out I can be notified through my RSS reader each time I get a new email.

- Gchat. Right inside the email program, you can chat to other Gmail users. A very cool feature.

- Search capabilities. Some say this is the best feature. I’m sure other emails have searches, but Gmails is pretty slick. Search for keywords in your emails, and find just what your looking for - very quick.

- Spam filter. I don’t know what Gmail is doing different, but they catch EVERYTHING! You can also set up folders for emails to be routed to if you subscribe to website updates or coupon sites.

Ok, now how do I get one?! Sign up now! Along with your Gmail account, you’ll get access to Google Calendars, which is a whole other blog post on its own.

Here is a nice list of Gmail tips, tricks and hacks if you really get into it.

I don’t get much time to play online games, but the ones I do, and enjoy, I’ll be sure to post. This game had me trying over and over to keep that little white ball inside the blue box while trying to avoid the gray balls. All just using the arrow keys. Careful, it’s addicting! Click the image to start your own game.

Dunkin’ Donuts Puts Winter “On Ice” by Heralding First Day of Spring With First-Ever Nationwide “Free Iced Coffee Day”
Dunkin’ Donuts Restaurants Across the Country to Offer Free Iced Coffee All Day on March 21

Read more.

oldsalt Says:
March 20th, 2007 at 9:36 am e

Mr Tech guy,
Off topic, but my son recently told me he wants to download free music from the internet. He mentions limewire. I thought/think that downloading free music is illegal. Can you please clarify this for me and what do you know about limewire.

thanks,
oldsalt

=================================

To sum it up, whether you agree or disagree, as of today, downloading free (copywritten) music from the internet is illegal.

From the RIAA site:
“Online piracy is the unauthorized uploading of a copyrighted sound recording and making it available to the public, or downloading a sound recording from an Internet site, even if the recording isn’t resold. Online piracy may now also include certain uses of “streaming” technologies from the Internet.”

Back in the day, musicians lived the good life, making millions of dollars from album sales. On top of that, they made money from concert ticket sales as well as merchandise sales. When the digital revolution hit, and people found ways to create digital audio files, the music industry took a huge hit. Recording artists lost millions in album sales, many blamed it on digital music - mainly, file sharing.

File sharing is the practice of making files available for other users to download over the Internet and smaller networks. Usually file sharing follows the peer-to-peer (P2P) model, where the files are stored on and served by personal computers of the users. Most people who engage in file sharing are also downloading files that other users share. Sometimes these two activities are linked together. P2P file sharing is distinct from file trading in that downloading files from a P2P network does not require uploading, although some networks either provide incentives for uploading such as credits or force the sharing of files being currently downloaded.

Napster was the first file sharing software to be released by a couple of college guys just looking to share digital music. The service became so huge, that pretty soon early releases of songs and albums popped up (mainly Metallica and Dr. Dre) that resulted in lawsuits and the eventual shutdown of the service. Napster was shut down and deemed an illegal practice because the company had centralized servers that housed lists of users as well as some files for distribution.

After Napster was shut down, file sharing software like Limewire, Kazaa and Morpheus emerged. The reason these services haven’t been shut down: Limewire, Kazza and Morpheus are just programs that directly connect users. It is how the users choose to use it that make it illegal.
Another more recent popular form of downloading movies, music and software is through torrenting. BitTorrent, TorrentSpy, UTorrent are websites that house torrent files. You download the files and run the file through a torrent software for fast downloading. Again, torrenting can be used for legitimate downloading functions - it’s how people choose to use it that makes it illegal. Read more on how bittorent works.

If you haven’t heard, the RIAA has been assisting in several arrests for people downloading and sharing music. They have been cracking down on mass file sharing communities at colleges, all the way down to single users to make examples out of them. The RIAA in this most recent article, is making a case for punishing parents of kids who download music illegally, for not monitoring their children’s internet activity.

Legal music!
Here are some recourses for free legal music - some of these might not be popular artists, but it’s a good way to discover new music:
GarageBand.com and Creative Commons are free to download files from - mainly these are artists looking to make a name for themselves.

Pay sites:
iTunes Music Store: This is my personal favorite. Songs are just .99 cents each, or full albums for $9.99. I try to limit myself to one album a month. I also have been getting and giving, the itunes music store gift cards that you can find at Krogers or most retail shops. iTunes is probably the most popular music stores out there right now.
Yahoo Music, eMusic, Rhapsody to name a few - even Walmart and BestBuy have jumped into the online digital music store ring.

I hope all of this helped and I apologize for the long winded response. I wanted to cover all angles of this hot topic for those that might not know the history behind it all. Fortunately, I’m old enough to have been able to watch all of this unfold in front of me, so it’s been interesting to watch. And it’s not over yet, I wouldn’t be surprised if some of these laws were slightly overturned in the future. It’s hard to say. Anyone else care to add anything I might have missed?

Recently I switched from Mac to PC. I’ve been a mac dude all my life, working in graphic design in a Mactintosh production workflow.
Why did I switch? For one, it’s kind of my personal protest to Apple for being so over priced. Why would I spend $2000 on a notebook, when I can get a pc for less than half that price?! -Dedication I suppose, which, don’t get me wrong, I love Apple computers - and I have been a dedicated soul since first using them in my 3rd grade elemetary school. But, it’s time to try something new. I read a lot of blogs, and come across a lot of free open source software, and was always irritated when the instructions said - Sorry, Windows only!
So, we’ll see how it goes. Maybe a year from now, I’ll post back how I’m switching back to a Macintosh.

If you’re not aware, any computer you purchase now features pre-loaded Windows Vista. I’m hearing a lot of complaints around the internet of folks having all sorts of trouble with it. I’ve noticed a few bugs here and there, some software doesn’t play nice on Vista - that’s about the biggest bug. Everything else has been running pretty good. If you do dive into the world of Vista, be sure to check out PC Mags article: Quick Fixes for Five Nasty Vista Problems. - Also, check out the article from LifeHack: 10 Vista Tips

Software to think about adding as a PC user:

Firefox and Apple iTunes is a must. Check out this article I found if you’re having slow loading issues in Firefox 2.0 / Vista. Very helpful.

1. Open Office - I mentioned this before, it’s a very nice free solution if you can’t afford the normal Office package.

2. Gimp - a good photo manipulation tool if you don’t want to drop the $ on Adobe Photoshop. Gimp does most things PS does including layers and saving in multiple file formats.

3. Trillian - a chat program that dials you into multiple chat platforms - AOL, Yahoo and MSN. This is the one program I think might have some issues with Vista (random disconnects), but for the most part - it runs pretty good.

4. Filezilla - for all of your FTP needs.

5. The Unzip Wizard - A nice program that I found works better than winzip.

6. Back up those DVD’s you purchased (or to your iPod Video): If you have the space on your hard drive, check out the following programs in this tutorial: DVD to MP4

Post any other Vista tips or Windows software in the comments.

Call-em-all: Call-Em-All’s voice broadcasting service will allow you to easily record a message in your own voice or any voice you choose and automatically send it to every phone number on your list.

- I’m not quite sure how I would use this, but it does sound interesting. I suppose if you have that many friends, and you’re too lazy to call them all individually to let them know where you’ll be Friday night, this would be perfect.

Ever call a customer service line, and get a total run-around. Then you call back later, and they tell you something totally different? 321-Call-Log to the rescue!

321-CALL-LOG provides you with a record of your customer service interactions. You will have access to recordings of phone calls you’ve made to customer service centers, as well as basic metrics about your call (date and time, duration, and which party initiated the disconnect). You can also keep a record of email interactions that you’ve had with customer service centers. The service does not require the use of any special hardware or software either by consumers or call centers and it is absolutely free to use.

Apology-Bot 3000: Gotta love these commercial prank call sites. They just keep coming out. This one gives you a series of questions to answer, then a place to enter your phone number (yeah I made one up), and then your friends phone number. Hours of fun. Thanks Dan for sending this my way.