Using the Stanislaus County Library Computer Resources
Bravo! Good work, Stanislaus County Library technology folks. The free internet access and computer resources at the library are great.
I recall going to the library five or so years ago and being frustrated at not having wifi wireless access for my laptop. Years back, I recall going to my local Manteca library (part of the Stockton-San Joaquin County Public Library system) and using the computer for catalog access on a dumb Wyse terminal with a monochrome-orange, text-only monitor.
Free Long Distance with Google Voice
Are you paying for Long Distance? What would you do if you could call Long Distance for free, any time, as much as you wanted?
I've written about Google Voice in the past, but I wanted to simplify the steps to use Google Voice to make free Long Distance calls for the common-day non-technical person.
Why you want Google Voice
Moments ago this conversation took place via SMS to my Google Voice number:
(408) 642-XXXX: My bad bt wat u doen 2:47 PM
Me: Who is this? 3:16 PM
(408) 642-XXXX: Wh0 iS dIS 3:16 PM
Me: Yes, that's what I asked. Who is this? 3:17 PM
(408) 642-XXXX: N0 N0 WH0 iS dISz 3:18 PM
Google Voice, Phones, Unlimited, and some such
Today I received my Google Voice invite. Do you remember when Gmail was invite-only? It's like that, for now. You can read about the features here. However, unlike Gmail, account owners don't have the ability to send invites of their own (yet?).
So what is so special about Google Voice?
Address book syncing
I've got too many address books in too many places. With over 6000 contacts, I don't want to have think about how to merge or maintain the them on an ongoing basis. I've got two Thunderbird email address books, two Google GMail address books and my BlackBerry address book to deal with. I want them all to sync live. I don't want to have to run a Windows server in order to run a BES server [?] and maintain it just for contact syncing.
Blackberry Curve 8330 coming to MetroPCS
I've had a Blackberry 8830 World Edition with Verizon which was nice and fast, and very nice as a modem tether to my laptop. More recently I've had a Blackberry 8820 with AT&T - the slowest I've ever seen, and a carrier I'd recommend against if you want speed. The Verizon GPS was locked down, but Google Maps pin-pointed it close enough to get directions or do searches. AT&T has the GPS unlocked, but the internet sluggishness is so annoying, even ssh crawls. Bother are excellent phones, no matter the cell company flaws.
