Website Magazine Consumer Corner

Find Nearby Restaurants for $10 Per Person

If you're in the mood to eat out, but don't want to spend too much, you may want to take a look at Ueatcheap.com. Here, you can enter your city or ZIP code and you'll get a Google map in return with thumbtacks represented restaurants that offer meals for $10 or less per person. You can narrow results by choosing a type of cuisine and choose a radius to search from.
You can also add restaurants, read and write reviews and sign up for coupons and updates to your area.

Leave Voicemail Without Ringing the Phone

If, for one reason or another you want to leave someone a voicemail, but don't want to risk that they pick up the phone when you call, try slydial. It's pretty simple. Dial 267-slydial (267-759-3425) from your phone. When you hear the prompt, enter the number you want to call. Then, after some advertisements, you will be connected directly to the person's voicemail. It's free - but if you want to avoid the advertisements and such, you can sign up for a premium account.

Rip DVDs Onto Your Portable Device

DVD Catalyst is a Web-based service that lets you take your own DVDs and compress them to load onto your iPod, iPhone, PSP, Smartphone and other portable devices. It's pretty simple, you choose your portable device type, load a DVD and let the software do the work. An advanced version (about $20) comes with better features, including the ability to segment your videos, control quality, etc., but the free version should suit most people's needs.

StumbleAudio: StumbleUpon for Indie Music

If you like StumbleUpon's capability of finding websites you've never heard of and you're an indie music fan, check out StumbleAudio. On the top right, enter in an artist you like and on the left you will see a list of indie artists (you've probably never heard of before) who have similar qualities. In the center square, you can cycle through the chosen album. Click on the left for another similar artist, or click "Stumble" for something entirely different. You can also purchase songs from iTunes, Amazon, PayPlay and CD Baby, share the music with friends and vote if you like the song or not - signing up for an account will let you save your favorites. StumbleAudio boasts more than 2,000,000 songs in their index.

Google Adds Speech Recognition to Video Search

It's been in the works for quite some time and now Google's speech recognition for video is ready for limited release. For now it's only available with select political videos, but that will soon change. Simply enter in the word(s) you want to find in a video and you will get a list of videos that include that word or term, and small yellow dots on the play bar indicating where in the video it can be heard.

You can test it out here, and also add it as a widget in your iGoogle page.

iPhone Sales and App Downloads Amaze

If the first weekend of iPhone sales and app downloads are any indication, the mobile era is about to match and possibly exceed every expectation set forth.

More than one million iPhones were sold this past weekend (Friday - Sunday) across 21 countries worldwide. By comparison, the first generation sold one million units in 74 days. And that's despite some stores running out of inventory.

What might be even more impressive is that 10 million apps were download during the same time frame. Now that includes the new 3G iPhone and older iPhones with the software upgrade. And that's despite many stores having problems activating the phones on the spot and overloads that caused the App Store to crash on occasion. It says that mobile users are ready for a full-on mobile Web experience - and they're willing to pay for it. Specifics are not available but many of the most popular apps are paid, ranging in price from $0.99 to $9.99 and up. That means that if you're a solid developer, there's gold in them thar hills!

It's interesting that the top paid apps are overwhelming of the gaming and entertainment variety while the top free apps are of a more useful function - including three social networking apps. A good sign that social networking has a wide-open opportunity to become a truly ubiquitous, global phenomenon that could forever change how humans interact.

The top paid apps downloaded so far:

Super Monkey Ball (game)
Texas Hold'em (game)
Enigmo (game)
Crash Bandicoot (game)
MLB.com At Bat (sports - real-time scores and in-game video highlights)
Cro-Mag Rally (game)
iBeer (entertainment - an app that turns your screen into a "drinkable" beer mug)
TETRIS (game)
Moto Racer (game)
Scrabble (game)

The top free apps downloaded so far:

Remote (entertainment - control your Apple TV or music on your computer from your iPhone)
AIM (social networking)
WeatherBug (weather)
Facebook (social networking)
Pandora Radio (music)
PhoneSaber (entertainment - your iPhone turns into a light-saber, complete with swinging sounds)
AOL Radio (music)
MySpace Mobile (social networking)
Tap Tap Revenge (game)
Google Mobile App (reference)

Webcams: Friday Afternoon Time Killers

Welcome to Friday afternoon. A few more hours and you can officially celebrate the weekend. Here are a few webcams to help you reach quitting time.

Earthcam.com: One of the largest repositories of webcams on the 'Net. You can search by cam type, city or simply browse. Editor's picks are always a good place to start.

National Zoo: Check out the habitats of many different animals from the Smithsonian's National Zoo. Just like going to the real zoo - without the smell - and if the animals aren't out that day, it's not a wasted trip. Also on the site is plenty of information about the facility and the animals housed there. If you don't see the cam right away, scroll down a bit.

Monterey Bay Aquarium: This unique aquarium has a living kelp forest that exchanges and uses water right from Monterey Bay. You can view it and other cams from the facility here. If you get seasick, the kelp forest cam may not be for you.

Tennant WebCam: This Hartford, Connecticut insurance company has a webcam in one of their offices. So, maybe watching other people work will get you motiviated?

Evangelista's Barbershop: Great Britain's most famous barbershop, opened almost 80 years ago. Here you can - you guessed it - watch the locals get their hair cut while you listen to music and watch the elder local gents reading magazines in the waiting area.

Eco-friendly Shopping with EVO

If you want an environmentally responsible way to shop online, take a look at EVO.com. This site lists over 100,000 products and services from more than 1,200 vendors that all claim to be "green." There's everything listed here from hybrid autos to bedding, batteries to organic flowers. Products and retailers are rated by environmental impact, energy consumption, use of sustainable materials and more for a "greenness" rating (represented by a number of leaves) to make sure that you really are getting a green product. The site does not actually sell products, but offers photos prices and descriptions that are linked to the retailer's site.

Sign up for an account and EVO will plant a tree on your behalf.

iPhone App Store Open for Business

It's here, one day ahead of the release of the 3G iPhone. The App store is available. You will need to upgrade to the latest version of iTunes (7.7) then get started browsing and buying to really get the best out of your new device. And you will have plenty to choose from, about 500 at the moment in several different categories: Business, Education, Travel, Weather, Utilities, Socail Networking, Sports, Music, Games and much more. Most will fall between $.99 - $9.99, although there are more expensive options. And because you will be spending real money here, it might be a good idea to wait for a few days and see some user ratings from early guinea pigs.

One other resource, you're going to need a cool custom wallpaper for your new iPhone. Head over to Poolga where they have about 150 custom wallpapers all made by professional designers.

Voice Powered Search, SMS, Email and More

Small keypads are one reason to take advantage of voice commands. Using your mobile on the road is another. Vlingo has a voice-activated service that will help you search, send SMS messages, email, make phone calls or any application with a text field all by speaking into your mobile. The service is optimal for BlackBerrys and supports Yahoo! oneSearch.

Download the application and click the icon on your mobile to get started. After speaking your command, Vlingo will confirm your request before returing results.

Check out the Vlingo website for a video demonstration.

Flickr Teams Up With Getty Images

Yahoo's Flickr and Getty have partnered up and this could mean potential revenue for all the shutterbugs out there. The deal allows Getty to contact Flickr members directly to request images for a special Flickr-branded Getty collection. According to early reports, if you are contacted by Getty, you will have to sign a contributor contract that states you as the owner of the photo and sets rates for purchase based on sizes and intended commercial usage. The Flickr blog states that, "Flickr are joining forces to create a collection of royalty free, rights ready and rights managed photographs."

Yahoo does not appear to be involved in the business transaction, so it's unclear how they will profit from the arrangement.

Expect further details later. Also according to the Flickr blog this will all happen soon. "If you’ve been a member for some years, you’ll know that we’re rather “mum” on information about when new features will launch. Soon can mean tomorrow, next month or even two years from now. We’re hoping that the Flickr Collection on Getty Images will debut later this year."

Online Karaoke For Everyone!

Can't get enough American Idol? Feel like crooning to the masses even when you're not at your favorite karaoke bar? Check out Red Karaoke, a social network for amateur singers. You can simply listen to others' renditions of popular songs, or sign up for an account, choose your song and start recording your own masterpieces. Sing into your microphone, upload the song then share it with the community to receive votes and comments - all the while building your fan base. You can also record video with your webcam for the full rock star experience.

Who knows, you just might be the next big act signed fresh from the Web by Justin Timberlake

Veetle: Live HD TV and Movies

On the heels of Hulu.com, Veetle is yet another video service that gives users free access to online video, in HD quality and with live broadcasts. You must first download the Veetle TV player, then you can choose from a variety of programming including HD movies, coverage of Tour de France and soon the Summer Olympics. It is not an on-demand service, so you are at the mercy of the current programming. For example, movies will rotate all day, so you have to jump in at the right time to catch the full-length feature.

An interesting feature of Veetle is the ability to broadcast your own video material live - either through DVD, webcam, video files a tuner card or your TV. To broadcast your own material, you will need a computer with a CPU of 2GHz, and a broadband connection, according to the site.

It's an interesting idea and although offerings are limited and its not the most attractive interface, it's worth a look. We'll soon see if and how they get around copyright infringement.

New SwissMemory Drive with Laser Pointer

Who doesn't love a good laser pointer? They're good for presentations, the classroom, annoying coworkers and driving your cat insane. The new USB flash drive from Victorinox/Swiss Army features 2GB capacity, a blade, nail file/screwdriver, scissors, retractable ball point pen and, of course, a laser beam - visible up to 70' or 300' in "complete darkeness."

Oh, and it will set you back $148. And I assume you can't bring it on airplanes or into any heavily-secured buildings. But hey, it has a laser.

Your Ultimate July 4th Guide

Are you ready for the big holiday celebrations? If you need a little help, I have some resources for you. And, in observance of the July 4th holiday, this will have to serve as Friday Afternoon Time Killers. So stop watching the clock and check out some ways to have a great holiday.

First, you should know a little about the holiday before heading out. This way, when your elders quiz you, you'll look like a fine upstanding citizen, and you can educate all those young whippersnappers. Head over to History.com's Fourth of July page. There's video, historic maps and just about everything else you need to know about the early days of the U.S. Don't forget to read the Declaration of Independence - pretty inspiring stuff.

Next, you need to get to that barbeque, pool party or fireworks show. Check out GasBuddy. Here you can find the cheapest gas in your area to fuel up before heading out. Want to see something really scary? Check out the Historical Price Charts.

The kids are going to need some entertaining, so visit Disney's FamilyFun.com. Here you can print out coloring pages, get tips on arts and crafts, get some party ideas and learn some kid-friendly games for the big barbecue.

What's a 4th of July celebration without a big spread? My favorite part of the holiday. Check out these videos for some sure-fire BBQ.

Ribs!

Burgers!

And my personal favorite, Beer Can Chicken!

Last but not least, you'll need some fireworks. If you don't have your own stockpile, the best place to find fireworks shows in your area is Metromix.com. The major cities are covered, along with their suburbs.

Have a wonderful and safe holiday weekend!