After months of waiting, I was finally given a Yahoo! Mail Beta account today for my primary email address. I’ve already had it for several months on my Junk email address (which I’ve had for about ten years), but now I’m ready to use it full-time. I’ve also got an account on Windows Live Mail (the successor to hotmail) and Gmail, both of which I also use regularly. The main reason I use Yahoo! Mail primarily isn’t necessarily because I like the features best, but probably more because I’ve used it for so long and that’s where most of my email is at. I’m sure many others have already written reviews like this, but this is partly a personal exercise as I evaluate switching to another web-based email service. Each of these services, in my opinion, is better than the previous offerings by the companies, so I’m glad that they’re all out there. Which one will I use more permanently? Stay tuned. I haven’t quite decided that one yet. Read on to see pros and cons of each service.
Category Archives: Technology
I miss my mac…
My wife and I have different desktop preferences. Sometimes she wants to use my computer for just a few minutes, but she’s afraid to mess up the programs I already have running. I know we could do this with Windows fast user switching, but I miss fast user switching on a Mac.
Productive Bookmarklets
I recently discovered blummy – The bookmarklet management bookmarklet and I think it’s extremely useful. Most of you have probably seen a bookmarks toolbar in your web browser. Basically, the bookmarks toolbar allows you quick access to a few bookmarks (or favorites, for you Internet Explorer folks). A bookmarklet is a bookmark that performs some other function. For example, I have a bookmarklet that I can use to post things to del.icio.us. Others can show the pagerank of a website. The reason blummy is cool is because it allows you to create your own bookmarklets and combine them into one, saving tons of space on your bookmarks toolbar. Plus, you can browse bookmarklets created by other people. You can configure it just how you want, and it’s free! What are you waiting for? You need to check out blummy.
Ubuntu: The Good and The Bad
My Windows machine crashed about a year ago, and I finally said I’d had enough with the reinstalls and decided to pick up Linux. I’d been reading about Ubuntu for a while, but at first I thought it was just really overhyped. I’ve really come to enjoy a lot about it since I installed it back in March. Let me tell you about a few of the things I like, followed with what I don’t like.
The Power of Social Networking
No, social networking isn’t about communism. It’s about connecting with other people and leveraging the people you already know to help you. I remember talking about the importance of networking with BPA in high school, but I’m just now realizing the power that it has.
Everyone knows about the importance of networking when looking for a job, but are you aware that it can help you once you already have a job? Did you know that your peers might actually have something worthwhile to say? Social networking helps you communicate some of those things. For me, the best social networking websites are those that can give you benefit even if your friends aren’t already signed up. Del.icio.us is a prime example of that: they are “a collection of favorites: yours and everyone else’s”. Even though I might not know a lot of people that use this site, it’s still very useful to me. I can save my bookmarks and use them from any computer (and I do – I use it all the time from school, at work, and at home). Feel free to read my del.icio.us links.
Websites like this allow for community learning. That’s important! We can’t expect to be able to learn everything by ourselves, or even to be able to find the few needles of useful websites in the haystack that is the Internet. This can apply to spiritual aspects, as well. The ancient American prophet Moroni highlights this in The Book of Mormon (Moroni 6:5), “And the church did meet together oft, to fast and to pray, and to speak one with another concerning the welfare of their souls.”
Although this scripture directly applies to literal church meetings, the Internet has plenty of useful websites that allow this type of conversation. Wikis such as Feast upon the Word and MormonWiki.com allow for some of that conversation. Do you know of any more out there? What sites do you like to visit?