The newest version of Firefox has just been released, and it looks to be quite an improvement over previous versions.
You can head to the Get Firefox site to download it right now, and from my little time using it thus far, it looks to be worth it. The browser seems to be considerably smoother in rendering pages, and just feels a bit quicker in a lot of its activities. The true test will come with time of course, but it seems to be a marked improvement over previous versions.
Personas: Personalize the look of your Firefox by selecting new themes called Personas in a single click and without a restart
Plugin Updater: To keep you safe from potential security vulnerabilities, Firefox will now detect out of date plugins
Stability improvements: Firefox 3.6 significantly decreased crashes caused by third party software – all without sacrificing our extensibility in any way
Form Complete: When filling out an online form, Firefox suggests information for fields based on your common answers in similar field
Performance: Improved JavaScript performance, overall browser responsiveness, and startup time
Open Video and Audio: With the world’s best implementation of HTML 5 audio and video support, now video can be displayed full screen and supports poster frames
If you’re a Firefox user, this looks like a “must have” update to be sure.
Have you ever wondered which of the big four cell phone carriers in the United States was actually the cheapest? Well, thanks to BillShrink.com, we now have a pretty good idea.
Yesterday, the money saving Web site BillShrink.com released a graphic that compared the major cell phone plans of AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile and Verizon so you could see at an easy glance how they stacked up against one another. You can click on the image for a much larger version, but we’ll give you the short version … it appears Sprint wins. This isn’t to say that Sprint is dirt cheap, but compared to the other three big carriers, it pretty soundly trounces them on every type of plan.
Depending on if you need a specific phone, or you live in an area that they don’t cover that well, this chart pretty much says there is no reason not to go with Sprint, especially if monthly fees are your primary concern.
This new collection are all tracks that were previously available to Hollywood productions, and this is the first time they are being offered in such a way that even people producing video from their basements can afford to use them in a production. “When we launched our first high end collection in October, we received overwhelming positive feedback from the community about its unprecedented quality, size, and scope”, said AudioMicro CEO Ryan Born. “We are excited to enhance our archive of premium content with 20,000 new tracks in the Platinum Collection.”
With the addition of these new tracks, AudioMicro is now offering over 200,000 music tracks and sound effects for use royalty free in productions. If you’re producing a podcast of videocast, this site is a must visit.
Apple has sent out invites to the likes of Engadget inviting them to a press event to be held at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts Theater in San Francisco at 10:00 am PST on Wednesday the 27th.
With the tagline of “Come see our latest creation.”, the feeling is that this will finally be the announcement of the long rumored Apple Tablet, which some are also calling the iSlate due to some legal documents filed by the company. While there are no guarantees that is what is being unveiled next week, it would require a new product from Apple to have been developed with absolutely no leaked information coming out at all, a fairly unlikely situation.
Traditionally Apple has held events on Tuesdays, so the original assumption had been this event would be on the 26th as it was known Apple had reserved the facility for a few days at the end of the January. There has been no word on why the event was moved from the traditional day.
We will have all of the news for you as soon as it comes out.
During this horrible time for the people of Haiti, it is easy to want to reach out and help the people impacted by this crisis. While this is a great thing, just make sure that the group you are donating to is a legitimate one.
As sad as it might be, scam artists take advantage of situations such as the one in Haiti to fill their own pockets. Luckily several sites have gathered together the legitimate places where one can donate to aid in the relief of the victims. The sites are:
Any resource listed on these pages is legitimate and 100% trustworthy. Do NOT trust any charities that email you, run ads on sites, text you out of the blue and so on. While some of them may be on the up and up, you can’t take the risk. Please make sure that whomever you decide to donate through is who they say they are, and that the money is going where they claim it is.
Verizon announed on friday that it was lowering its unlimited calling plan, and not to be outdone, AT&T quickly followed suit.
Even with reduced prices, cellular plan prices in the United States are outrageous compared to other parts of the world. That being said, we should still be grateful for any prices breaks we receive, and due to Verizon lowering its prices on Friday, AT&T followed suit. The best news is that current customers will get the new pricing without having to extend their contracts and will receive no penalties for getting this new pricing.
While it is nice to see some sort of drops, you are still looking at prices like $1200 a year for unlimited voice and data on the iPhone via AT&T, and texting costs more on top of that, and is usually in the area of $2o a month. Although it has been proven that texting actually costs carriers nothing, they still feel the need to charge us each month depending on the volume of messages we send and receive.
So, yes, yay for Verizon and AT&T getting in a price war! Now they are robbing us slightly less then they were even a week ago! Make sure you have the cheapest plan you can possibly have, and hopefully you can save at least some money, but just remember that you are still paying some of the highest cell phone rates in the world.
Just a word of warning, never trust a text message about your bank account as being authentic.
Two of us here at StarterTech have gotten the following text message this week from “9099″:
customer issue, us bank service frozen. please call at 802 221 1115
Both of us have accounts with this chain, but Rosemary, who was the first to get the message, called the local branch directly and confirmed there were no issues with her account. We were suspicious of the message from the start for the main reason she has never given the bank her cell phone number. Also upon talking to the bank, they were confused by the verbiage as it didn’t sound like anything the bank uses.
Today when I got the text, I used a Skype account to call the listed phone number so it would show up as unknown on caller ID. I got a message about the mailbox being full, and that was it.
As with scam emails, pay attention to the style of the text.
Notice there are no capital letters
Improper use of grammar
No personalization
This is a classic “phishing” attack, and it is just the type that throws a wide net. We have received similar texts about other banks we don’t even have accounts with, but they know they will hit people who do have accounts with them.
An image that says “I’m With COCO” is quickly over taking Facebook, and in case you don’t know what it’s about, it is an image to show your support for Conan O’Brien in his current dispute with NBC over the announcement his time slot would be given to Jay Leno. (You can click the image to the right for a full-sized version of it that you can use as you see fit)
The online movement to express displeasure with NBC over the company’s treatment of the recently installed host of The Tonight Show has been an interesting study in the power of social media. Most online polls are showing 83% of respondents back Conan O’Brien in all of this craziness, and the online movement only seems to be picking up momentum to the point that NBC is going to have no choice but to actually pay attention to it.
It is by no means the most important story in the world right now, but it is an interesting example of how social media can so rapidly react to a rapidly developing story. With each new bit of info, the news is spreading rapidly and O’Brien fans are reacting quickly to how thet best help the late night host they have opted to back.
So, if you’re on the team, check out the original I’m With COCO page and show your support for the man with the funny hair.
Google is adding file storage to its Google Docs product that will allow you to store any type of file you want.
According to the Google Docs blog, the new service will be rolled out to all users over the next few weeks and will allow you to upload any type of file you want up to 250 MB in size up to a total of 1 GB of storage. Additional GBs of storage are available at the rate of $.25 per GB per year. Storage folders can be shared with users of your choice to make it easy for parties spread out around the country or world who are working on the same project can work together on all of the necessary files.
There is no word yet on a file uploading program, but there almost has to be to make this service truly usable.
There are two worrying aspects to this service:
Do we really want to let Google have an even deeper look into our lives? There seems to be no end to the amount of information it wants out of us, and having access to our files to boot just seems a little silly of us to give.
With the ability to share files with friends, can anyone say “piracy”? I knew you could. Google just made it easy for friends to share as much music with one another as they would like to.
It is amazing how many services Google rolls out, but it doesn’t always mean it’s a great idea for the users.
It seems that Continental is getting the idea that it is e-mail that matters the most to travelers, and not all of the other bells and whistles of the Internet.
Many airlines have been playing around with offering Wi-Fi for a fee on their planers, but according to The New York Times, Continental is testing a system where they will provide you with free e-mail access, but if you want to do more than that it’ll cost you.
Personally I think this is a fantastic idea. As I’m 6’3″, the idea of trying to take up some of my cramped seating in coach with my laptop has never appealed to me, but getting out my iPod Touch to just work on cleaning up my e-mail would thrill me. The Continental flights will be offering both the e-mail only solution and the full Wi-Fi for a while so that they can see which service people seem to prefer.
Considering the length of most domestic flights, I would say the e-mail only solution is going to be the over-whelming winner … that, and it’s free.
The newest version of Firefox has just been released, and it looks to be quite an improvement over previous versions.
Apparently the stock sound effects and music business is booming if the latest news from AudioMicro is anything to judge by.
During this horrible time for the people of Haiti, it is easy to want to reach out and help the people impacted by this crisis. While this is a great thing, just make sure that the group you are donating to is a legitimate one.
Verizon announed on friday that it was lowering its unlimited calling plan, and not to be outdone, AT&T quickly followed suit.
Just a word of warning, never trust a text message about your bank account as being authentic.
Google is adding file storage to its Google Docs product that will allow you to store any type of file you want.
It seems that Continental is getting the idea that it is e-mail that matters the most to travelers, and not all of the other bells and whistles of the Internet.
