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We hate companies that make it hard for you to reach them. Teleprompters are the enemy. I personally start yelling “Customer Service” into my phone whenever I am asked to press 1 if I speak English. Now, with GetHuman, we have a comprehensive database of direct call phone numbers to reach customer service centers for virtually any company at our fingertips.

With direct call phone numbers, there is no need to wait 30 minutes to speak to a customer service representative. You can call representatives directly. They feature secret phone numbers for companies like AT&T, Verizon, and Sprint. Their database of numbers includes over 8000 major corporations.

Alternate Ways to Get Hold of Customer Service

The numbers are not always direct call phone numbers though. Corporations realized people can readily access their direct call phone numbers that they intended to reserve for elite clientele. Many companies have disabled their direct call phone numbers. However, GetHuman addresses this by detailing the fastest way to get hold of a customer representative.

For example, for the Sprint number you are given their normal customer service phone number and directions to reach a representative in the fastest way possible. They tell you exactly which numbers to push at each of the prompts along with the average wait time that other users have reported.

E-Mail the VP, Have Them Call You, or Even Call Without a Phone

They do a great job at keeping their records up to date. On top of wait times and fastest call directions, they feature alternate connection methods. With Sprint, you can connect with the VP of Customer Service via e-mail; this method is rated as the best method for communicating with Sprint by GetHuman members. Their large user base corrects outdated information.

Recently, GetHuman also integrated LucyPhone which is a service that has companies call you. When we tested the feature, Sprint called us back almost immediately.

Voicemail Left 13 Minutes After Using LucyPhone

On top that, they integrate with Zingaya which allows you to make customer service calls over the internet. Albeit, with Zingaya, you will have to go through the same prompts you would if you called with your phone (so just use the prompt directions supplied at GetHuman).

That’s not it either! GetHuman integrates with Facebook and TalkTo too. With the Facebook integration, you can save the pages that are most useful to you for future reference. On top of that, if you login with Facebook and share the service with your friends you can disable the advertisements on the website.

And with the TalkTo feature you can actually text a company over the internet directly from GetHuman and have the response texted to you or e-mailed to you. When we tried this with AT&T, we got a reply in 5 minutes. However, bear in mind that some of these integrations are not available for all of the direct call phone numbers that GetHuman has in their database.

The post Want to Never Get Put on Hold Again? appeared first on The Best Sites.

Pablo Picasso’s Short Biography

Pablo Picasso is well-praised as one of the greatest artists of all time. Born on October 25, 1881, in Malaga, Spain, Pablo Picasso began his childhood immersed in art learning from his father. After a successful career, his well-known name now rings bells in households all across the world. His artworks are some of the greatest of the 20th century. Perhaps one of his greater accomplishments is creating Cubism along with Georges Braque. Pablo kept painting until his death. Finally, after spending 80 of his 91 years painting, he died April 8th, 1973 in Mougins, France leaving us all wanting more.^Bio

Most Famous Pablo Picasso Paintings

Click any of the thumbnails to be immersed in a full screen gallery of Pablo Picasso’s most famous paintings.

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Learn “How to Make a Book Float” on wikiHow.com!

We are lucky to live in an age where the Internet is so readily accessible. Anything you want to learn can be found online, but how do you know for sure if the article that you have located is written by a qualified professional? If you are looking for one of the best how to guides online, try wikiHow, the site that is “owned by everyone”.

Screenshot of wikiHow’s Home Page

This site is great for its wide variety of information, advice, reviews and tips. It is a wiki-based online collaborative community. Users can log on and create one of the best how to guides on any topic imaginable, in a fashion similar to Wikipedia. Readers can then choose to utilize this information or to offer edits and additions based on their own level of expertise in that perspective field.

Ask Follow-up Questions on wikiHow.com

The topics range from the silly, like How to Make a Book Float, to the more technical variety, such as How to Overlay Sectional Aeronautical Charts in Google Earth. You can search by categories or by simply typing in a few words in the search window. It’s incredibly easy to use, and with a few clicks of the mouse, you too can begin to educate the world on how to “let the cat out of the bag” by joining one of the best how to guides online!

WikiHow is growing in leaps and bounds as people from all over the Internet want to have more confidence in the information that they are finding online. Because this instructive website allows for anyone in the Wikihow community to edit or add information to any of its postings, an added sense of trust is automatically built-in to the content found on Wikihow. Readers of the how to guides can ask follow-up questions directly to the writer for more in-depth knowledge.

Nominate Poor Content for Deletion on wikiHow.com

The site also monitors all postings, edits, and additions through a staff of volunteers. You can opt to follow your own article submissions by watching, reviewing and re-editing the edits that others provide to your posting. Another reason that Wikihow is one of the best how to guides on the Internet today is due to is “Nominations for Deletion” category. This works as a sort of “community action” self monitoring method to alert the administration of questionable content. Perhaps the article is mean spirited, sexually charged, inaccurate, or just plain wrong! This helps keep the “junk” off of this best how to guides.

Wikihow makes the whole process of editing extremely easy. After logging in, you are brought to a simple screen that allows you to start actively contributing as an editor. In this way, Wikihow funnels viewers into a pool of potential editors.

Screenshot of Welcome Screen After Signing Up

A Brief Review of the History of wikiHow.com

WikiHow is free to use, but the administrators make it very clear that Wikihow is a hybrid organization. It is a cross between a “non-profit” and a “business”. The non-profit characteristics are that its ultimate goal is simply to provide the world with useful and valuable information to enhance the public good and to benefit the life of the individual. But like a business, it has to make money in order to stay alive. Therefore, they allow for advertising, but also allow the readers to “hide ads” with the push of a button. If only more websites would follow this trend.

This best how to guides website likes to say that it is “owed by everyone “, but wikiHow actually began as eHow.com back in 1990. EHow eventually declared bankruptcy and was later bought by Jack Herrick and Josh Hannah. By late 2009, the site was boasting 20 million monthly visitors and now has a global Alexa traffic ranking in the top 500 and is a Top 300 of the US Ranks consistently. With articles that are fast approaching 150 million by number of posts, wikiHow has become one of the best how to guides online today. They have been reviewed by The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal and everywhere in between. It looks like wikiHow is here to stay!

Some of the Best How to Guides on wikiHow.com

Check out these fun…and funny postings:

• How to Be Successful in Dating a Millionaire
• How to Get Your Ex Girlfriend Back
• How to Measure Your Bra Size
• How to Do a Tech Deck Trick the Double and Back
• How to Invest in Bonds
• How to Apply For a Marriage License in Alaska
• How to Increase Website Traffic

 

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Best Science Website or Just One of Them?

Is Scientific American the best science website? No but it is certainly one of the best science websites. Their well established brand dates back all the way back to August 28th, 1845 when they published their first magazine issue.^Wikipedia

Their magazine continues to be published to this day, making Scientific American the oldest continuously published magazine in the United States. Over time, their publication established a brand that is continually trusted as a source for reliable information. With nearly half a million subscribers, Scientific American makes a significant impact on educating the public on current scientific issues.

Einstein Wrote for Scientific American

The monthly release covers a broad range of topics. Scientific American is aimed towards educated people but is still highly readable. Through their clarity on complex subjects, Scientific American has earned its high status and become a valuable resource for everyone from students to scientists. Many famous scientists, including Albert Einstein, have contributed articles to what now may be umbrella brand for best science website.

A Landslide of Rich Content, All Organized Properly

Scientific American has articles on a broad range of subjects. Our favorite articles include, “How Can We Cope with the Dirty Water from Fracking?” and “It’s a Water-Full World“. Their website does a satisfactory job at organizing their articles but is bloated with promotions for their magazine subscription. For a better organized website that tackles the science of stuff consider HowStuffWorks.

They categorize their content in several different ways. Like any standard website, you can browse through their topics. You can also browse through In-Depth Reports which are essentially collections of past articles that relate to each other.

The content available at Scientific American is not limited to just articles though. Scientific American is well-known for publishing rich media infographics that tackle tough subjects.  One of our favorites is their collection of Interactive Features which has things ranging from timelines that might be titled A History of Limb Lengthening to animations on How Large Stars Die. You can also find staff blogs, videos, and even a section geared towards the education-minded. Podcast listeners might also be interested in their 60-second podcasts.

Scientific American’s Side Project Aims to Decode Whale Cries

Recently, Scientific American started Whale FM which is an interactive website that is intended to help marine researchers. The website asks that you listen to a sound clip of a whale and help match it up with similar whale sounds. The issue they are aiming to solve is the confusion between different whale and dolphin dialects.

Scientific American wants your help. Maybe Scientific American is not the best science website but you can help them become the best science website for whales.

Latest Scientific American Covers

Click any of the covers to be immersed in a full screen gallery of the latest magazine issue covers.

The post Best Science Website for Whales. Yes. Whales. appeared first on The Best Sites.

Hide Your IP Address with Hide My Ass!

While proxies do add a layer of protection and privacy to whatever you are doing online, it is entirely possible that you will get caught anyway. There is a case where a certain high profile hacker had his IP address released by Hide My Ass!. From this we see that Hide My Ass! does keep logs of your activity and that Hide My Ass! will not protect your ass when lawyers come knocking at their door.

Using Hide My Ass! is straight forward. You can connect to any website through their proxy by going to their home page and entering the URL. Alternatively, if you have Chrome or Firefox, you can install their addons (links to these extensions are available in our sidebar).

Best Free Proxy Service Decreases Speed by 54%

Comparing the page load times of our homepage by connecting to it directly and with Hide My Ass!, we see that using a proxy service significantly decreases speed. In this single test, our homepage loaded in 842ms by directly connecting to it. On the other hand, when using Hide My Ass! the page load time jumped up to 1.81s. In this case, the best free proxy service ended up slowing down the page load speed by 115%.

If you are using Hide My Ass! to unblock restricted content then that is great. However, since Hide My Ass! logs activity, you should use another proxy service if you are doing anything else. But before you go searching for a proxy service you should fully educate yourself on internet anonymity and all the reasons it does not exist. It is entirely possible that one day all the logs of these proxy servers will be publicly available – you have been forewarned.

Hide My Ass! offers the best free proxy service as a way of funneling customers into their premium VPN plan. With a VPN, your connection will be faster and more secure. However, there are other alternatives that may be worth investigating. This article only covers Hide My Ass! as the best free proxy service. Using their VPN will afford you protection on your mobile devices. Android users can follow this guide to set up Hide My Ass! VPN functionality and iPhone users can use this guide.

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Stroll Down Memory Lane with Classmates.com

Classmates.com is a social media website that allows the user to find and contact all of those people whose names and faces we may not remember from old high school yearbook archives. It is a great site to reconnect with old friends and school chums from kindergarten to grammar school all the way through to High School and College. More importantly, with the ability to share current as well as past photos, we can check out who has receding hair lines or expanded midsections.

It even provides access to old military buddies and comrades in arms. Since most of the younger generation have grown up with the Internet, email, Facebook and other social media tools used to keep in touch, this site is perfect for the older generation who were not given this luxury back in the “good ole’ days”. Classmates.com has recently changed its name to “Memory Lane”, although you can still access it by its old URL address. The new site is a hybrid that combines the Memory Lane website with the Classmates website.

Screenshot of Memory Lane Home Page

New Name, New Advancements, Same Old High School Yearbook Archives

With the transition to the new Memory Lane platform, a slight transition in concept enhancements also occurs.  Now that the social media site is more nostalgic in its content, Classmates.com has added a few things.  The site not only specializes in old high school yearbook archives but has now included multiple hot button pull down menus that focus on specific areas of reminiscence. Hit the Music Button and remember the hits from decades past. Want to revisit “The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson”?  Hit the “TV & Radio” Tab!  How about what sports stars who were so popular “back in the day”? Classmates.com has a link for that too.  Each pull down provides web pages chock full of black and white video footage, clips from movies, early “music videos” (pre-MTV, of course) and other fun fair.

Ever wonder what happened to the Head Cheerleader in High School that you had a thing for?

In 2003, CBS News did a cover story of two high school sweethearts reconnecting through the site’s old high school yearbook archives to reignite their love affair. Ever wonder what happened to the Head Cheerleader in High School that you had a thing for? Log on to Classmates.com and see what she’s up to. How about the Senior High School Football Captain that made your life as a Freshman a living Hell? He’s there too! You might have to compare his current picture to the picture in his old high school yearbook archives to recognize him though.

A Look into Classmates.com Membership

Classmates.com is simply a fun way to go back in time without having to wait for a class reunion. The basic membership allows access to old high school yearbook archives, but it doesn’t offer much in the way of interacting with your old friends.  You can search and create profiles, but you can’t send emails back and forth until you join as a full member. Memberships are available in 3 month, 1 year and 2 year increments, ranging from $15 to $59 respectively.

Browse Through Yearbooks with Classmates.com’s Slick Yearbook Browser

Created by Randy Conrads in 1995, United Online is now its current owner since 2004.  It boasts an Alexa Ranking near the Top 300 in the United States and has upwards of 40 Million Users. In June of 2012,  its parent company purchased the somewhat controversial Facebook App “Schoolfeed” hoping to absorb the Apps 19 Million more followers into its burgeoning membership.

Legal Issues with Hosting Old High School Yearbook Archives

Some people are not so fond of the service though. In 2008, a PC World journalist published an article titled, 5 Reasons I Hope Classmates.com Gets Sued Into Oblivion. To no surprise, in 2012 Classmates.com did actually get sued but the case only equated into paltry $3.93 payouts that totaled to $800,000. With an active membership of 40 million users, $800,000 is chump change. Regardless, now is the time to take advantage of the services available from Classmates.com; it might not be available forever.

Classmates.com for Other Countries

Classmates.com serves up old high school yearbook archives for American and Canadian schools. The umbrella company also hosts Classmate.com-like websites geared towards other countries under their Stayfriends brand.

• Stayfriends.de (Germany)
• Stayfriends.se (Sweden)
• Stayfriends.at (Austria)
• Trombi.com (France)

The post See if Your Yearbook Photo is on the Web appeared first on The Best Sites.

Playstation is building hype for something. Their new teaser leaves you with a connection between Playstation and February 20th, 2013. Maybe the PS4 is here? Be the first to know. We will know February 20th, 2013 at exactly 6PM according to the e-mail newsletter Sony is pushing.

The post Playstation 2013 appeared first on The Best Sites.

Lastpass: The Best Password Manager

If you have ever seen the classic 1932 Marx Brother’s Movie, “Horse Feathers”, you might remember a funny scene about a secret password into a certain Speakeasy being “Swordfish”. It’s one of the more famous and often quoted passwords still to this day. What if every restaurant, supermarket, and department store today had their own individual password? It would be pretty difficult to keep up! This is why we are presented with the need for the best password manager.

In today’s age of multiple email programs, social media outlets, and online financial services, it can often become increasingly overwhelming to manage all of these secret words and phrases. That’s where LastPass comes in. Considered by many technological gurus to be one of the best password manager software packages offered, the standard version of the software if FREE.  With an installation process that is very simple, LastPass will function properly for both Mac and PC users alike. Even Linux Operating systems are covered.

Screenshot of the LastPass Home Page

Best Password Manager is Easy to Install and User-Friendly too!

The LastPass installer program will ask if you want to add a plug-in to your web browsers, though this is not a requirement. In years past, the choices of web browser compatibility were somewhat limited, but with dozens of updates occurring over the years, it becomes compatible for All Browsers with the release of LastPass 2.0.20. The company’s commitment to continuous research and development is one of the reasons why LastPass is often considered to be the best password manager around.

The basic features that users find so helpful and practical include the software’s ability to consistently check and recheck your computer for insecurely stored data. Once detection of these unsafe entries are located within your web browsers, LastPass will offer to import this information and to delete it from your browser. It then stores all of this incredibly sensitive information online in a highly encrypted cloud. It also clears all recent LastPass data that was filled in through your web browsers when you log out of the system.

LastPass may be considered the best password manager online, but it also does so much more. The program will rate the strength of your chosen passwords and will even offer stronger password options if yours is considered to be weak. The user can also program the LastPass Dashboard to complete web forms by filling in as much or as little information into the user profile as desired. Information such as name,  address, phone numbers, email accounts, and credit card information can be included. You can also click a switch that will automatically cause LastPass to logout when you turn off the system. The software comes with a Helpdesk Handbook and “How-To” Video and even offers Credit Monitoring.

Another cool feature is the Virtual Keyboard. Since hackers cannot capture your mouse clicks but can only steal your keystrokes, Lastpass has included this neat gadget for added user peace of mind. This is available both on their website and through the user’s login dashboard after the software has been downloaded.

Is LastPass Turning into “Big Brother”?

To some users, LastPass may seem very “Big Brother”. It can be somewhat scary when you think about one company having all of your password information. But remember, LastPass is considered one of the best password manager software programs because it is so easy to use. It is able to detect all of your passwords and login information simply by installing a Free Download. Now think about who else can easily gain this invaluable information as well, and the thought of using LastPass becomes a little less terrifying.

LastPass has taken many precautions to ensure that none of their employees have access to your personal information, even if subpoenaed.  For these reasons, most of the online community agrees that LastPass is extremely safe and resistant to “brute force” attacks on its software.

As early as November of 2008, Mashable ranked Lastpass as one of the  Four Best Password Manager Systems for securing sensitive data. PCWorld jumped on board soon after, ranking them in the Top Four as well. As recently as February of 2013, the Today Show gave a “shout out” to this impressive FREE software.

What is “LastPass Premium”?

LastPass also offers an upgrade to a premium membership for only $1 per month. It comes with a Free 14-day Trial Period and allows the user to access additional features such as Multi-Factor Authentication. The Premium Membership also provides support  of mulitple mobile media apps for such devices as iPhone, Android or Windows Mobile. Although the $1 Fee is not “free” like the original version of the software, LastPass uses this minimal monthly payment as funding for the ongoing technological advancements to network security. For $12 Bucks a Year, that’s a pretty fair deal! Regardless of whether you choose the premium plan, LastPass is the best password manager.

The post Get Rid of Passwords Once and For All appeared first on The Best Sites.

Unbiased Insider Travel Guides, Curated by the Wikimedia Community

We have all traveled somewhere at some point in our lives, whether its to our significant other’s house or to some beach resort in a country other than our own. Traveling requires planning in advance, as well as familiarizing oneself with the area that you are visiting. But finding high quality travel guides for remote locations is nearly impossible. Lucky for us, the Wikimedia Foundation is here to help. Wikivoyage is a wiki hosted by the Wikimedia foundation (the same organization that hosts Wikipedia) that offers the best insider travel guides to virtually every destination around the world. The Huffington Post even claims that the site has 25,000+ travel guides.

Everyone is talking about this newly launched service. Wired, TechCrunch, and Mashable are all talking about the newly launched insider travel guide service. Perhaps the first to cover the service was Skift who stated that the service launched on January 15th, 2013.

Screenshot of the Wikivoyage Home Page

Wikivoyage provides several ways of browsing through information for curious browsers. You can also browse through their previously featured Destination of the Month, Off the Beaten Path, or Featured Travel Topic.

Wikivoyage was not always the best source for insider travel guides. The website actually began as Wikitravel. However, the majority of the editors left and brought their contributions to the Wikivoyage project in 2012 when the wiki was relaunched as a Wikimedia Foundation-hosted project.^Wikipedia Currently, although Wikitravel features more on their home page, the quality of the information is simply better at Wikivoyage. Their guides feature up-to-date infographics and the information seems to be more up-to-date.

Thousands of Insider Travel Guides

Wikivoyage is unique to other travel guide websites because it has thousands of insider travel guides. It does not focus on a particular country or region. The wiki hosts a plethora of information from locals and insiders organized into guides that cover even the most remote locations.

The website allows users to edit and create articles. This results in a wide range of insider travel guides for countless travel destinations created by the people who know their location the best.

A Wikipedia Platform for Travel Guides

The website is the Wikipedia of travel guides, which gives it the ability to offer a wide range of inputs and reviews from a variety of sources. While it is true that the credibility of Wiki sites is sometimes questioned, the large group of enthusiastic and meticulous editors at Wikivoyage provide insider travel guides that are of the highest caliber. The editing interface allows for local residents to write about their location, as well as for foreign visitors to describe their impressions of their destination.

Simplicity Meets Functionality at the Best Site for Insider Travel Guides

Another reason why Wikivoyage is the best source for insider travel guides is the ease by which information is found on these travel guide pages. Unlike other travel guides that tend to have scatter-brained information sprawled throughout their publications, Wikitravel has a simple to follow interface. You can search for any term on their website (such as Africa, Kenya or specific locations such as The Serengeti National Park), and you are brought to the travel guide for that term. The travel guides are then broken up by section using simple categorization titles such as “Get in”, “Get around”, “See”, “Stay safe”, and “Stay healthy”.

Free Insider Travel Guides and Free Language Gudies Too

As an added bonus, Wikitravel also offers free language guides for all of the countries of the world. For instance if you are looking up a travel guide to Russia, at the bottom of the guide you will see a link that says “Russian Phrasebook” that shows you how to read, understand, and pronounce all of the important terms a traveler to Russia may need to know.

Top Free Language Guides

• Chinese Phrasebook
• British and American English Language Variations Guide
• Spanish Phrasebook

The post Wikipedia’s Latest Innovation: Insider Travel Guides appeared first on The Best Sites.