Twitter is surprisingly addictive. When I first heard about it I thought, why would I want to send an SMS message to a bunch of people to let them know what I was doing? The idea of receiving a slew of texts wasn’t too appealing either especially if the content was stuff like “I am at the bus stop” or “I’m going to the grocery store”.  I joined Twitter reluctantly when I attended a technical conference back in September because the conference organizers were promoting it and communicating to attendees via the free service.

So what is Twitter? PC.com has a good write up titled Family friendly Twitter Tips and explains:

‘This free Web-based service shares qualities with blogging, social networking, instant messaging, and chatting, but is not exactly any of these things. Twitter allows you to broadcast 140-character dispatches (or “tweets”) to your friends and followers from your computer or cell phone; everything from what you’re doing at any given moment (“at coffee shop consuming 1500 calorie snack”) to links you want to pass along to replies to other Twitter users. Using Twitter isn’t unlike sitting in a friendly cafe overhearing bits conversation around you and then piping up when you feel like it.”

Read the rest of the PC.com article to see how you can use Twitter to keep up with your family. I’ve been using Twitter to broadcast blog updates and post random thoughts and activities. I’m not sending a Tweet for everything I do, but I can see (and follow a few people) how it’s easy to do.

Check out my Tweets at http://www.twitter.com/rbrambley, or if you sign up then follow me. I also have a widget in the sidebar of this web page with my 10 latest tweets.

Here are some other applications and add-ons to compliment Twitter that I have found useful. (more…)

Tribute to Queen from the Freemont Street Experience in Las Vegas NV

If you are looking for some free first person shooter games check out the 3 summarized in this post. With all three games available for Windows and Linux, these deathmatch open source alternatives offer a lot of characters and weapons with a healthy on-line community playing on numerous Internet servers. If you do not want to battle other players on the Internet, 2 of the 3 games have the option to also play locally against bots. These games also offer mods such as Capture the Flag and Team Deathmatch. (more…)

Lifehacker.com’s Banish telemarketers from your phone is a post that everyone needs to read. If you want to stop telemarketers from calling any of your phone numbers use the National Do Not Call Registry. Here’s some more information from donotcall.gov:

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT THE NATIONAL DO NOT CALL REGISTRY

The National Do Not Call Registry gives you a choice about whether to receive telemarketing calls at home. Most telemarketers should not call your number once it has been on the registry for 31 days. If they do, you can file a complaint at this Website. You can register your home or mobile phone for free.

Your registration will not expire. Telephone numbers placed on the National Do Not Call Registry will remain on it permanently due to the Do-Not-Call Improvement Act of 2007, which became law in February 2008. Read more about it at http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2008/04/dncfyi.shtm.

Ubuntu 8.04 has several cool features that were not previously available in past versions. The coolest is when you load the Ubuntu CD on a PC running Windows you have the option to perform a Wubi installation. The Wubi install installs like a Windows application (and it is removed as a Windows app too – i.e. from the Control Panel > Add / Remove programs) but configures your PC to dual boot Ubuntu and your Windows version. It does not modify partitions, the MBR, or any part of your hard disk. It simply creates a new folder named Ubuntu on the drive you choose to install to.

When I first tried the Wubi install I attempted to load it to the same partition Windows boots from. The installation failed, so I then installed it to my data partition and was successful. After a reboot I was prompted to choose which OS to boot. I selected Ubuntu and was amazed as my Lenovo T60p booted successfully. The only problem Ubuntu had with my hardware was that the wireless indicator L.E.D. did not light up, but wireless was working fine.

I was then able to download and install packages / updates, modify my theme and appearance, and configure Ubuntu as you would expect. I could even access my Windows files because the data partition was mounted as /host and the boot partition could be mounted as a removable drive. The end result is the screenshot of my dsktop in this post. (more…)

Lifehacker.com post Free Fax: Drop.io Adds Free, Simple Faxing points out a totally free internet fax service:

“Drop.io now sends and receives faxes for free. To send a fax, just upload a document to Drop.io, enter the fax number, and click Fax. To receive a fax, Drop.io generates a cover sheet you email to the sender; as long as they use your cover page on the fax, it will end up in your Drop.io account as a PDF. Like most of Drop.io, faxing services are free and require no registration to use.”

Technorati Tags: fax, internet, free, pdf

Lifehacker.com’s post Top 10 Free Video Rippers, Encoders, and Converters reports:

“Commercial video converter software’s aplenty, but there are several solid free utilities that can convert your video files on every operating system, or if you’ve just got a web browser and a quick clip. Put DVDs on your iPod, YouTube videos on DVD, or convert any video file with today’s top 10 free video rippers, encoders and converters.”

Here’s the list of all ten of the utilities. Read the entire article at the link above for more details on each one. (more…)

I could not agree more with the consensus to uninstall Norton in the thread at Norton stinks | Ask Metafilter. It seems all new home desktops and notebooks come with Norton pre-installed with a 1 year license subscription for updates (I’m not sure of the exact time period because I uninstall it asap). Do yourself a favor and uninstall Norton immediately. Especially before you renew the license.

I recommend either ClamWin or AVG. Both are free, protect your email, have real time and scheduled scans, and have (more…)

Whenever family and friends come to me and say my PC is running slow the first thing I do is install and run the free utility CCleaner for them. The features page on ccleaner.com explain why:

Program Summary:

CCleaner is a freeware PC optimization tool.
It combines a system cleaner that removes unused and temporary files from your system and also a fully featured registry cleaner!
CCleaner allows Windows to run faster, more efficiently and gives you more hard disk space.
The best part is that it’s Small, Fast and Free!

Cleans the following Windows components: (more…)

Winamp Remote, powered by Orb, is a new beta service that allows you to stream your music and videos to any device that has an Internet connection. Specifically, if you connect your Wii to your home wireless network, spend $5 and buy the Internet channel and the Opera Browser, and install Winamp Remote on any Windows computer running Winamp you can stream any files in the Winamp library to your Wii.

From Winamp.com:

“Access and Share Your Music and Videos On the Go

Winamp Remote turns your home computer into a streaming server and play your music and videos on the go from any PC web browser, compatible cell phones, and TVs with a connected Wii, Xbox 360, or PlayStation 3. Also, share and discover (more…)