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The Dawn of the Digital Pocket Watch – Keeping Time In Today’s Day of Cell Phone Domination

The other day someone stopped me to ask me for the time.  I did the funniest thing, something I apparently ALWAYS do when someone asks me what the time is but I never really think about it.  I stopped and checked my cell phone!  In the last ten years my cell phone has replaced any form of watch in my life!  How did this happen?  I’m not really sure but it is interesting… to me.

I do remember the days of wearing a watch.  I remember having various types through my childhood.  I remember having that sweaty mark underneath the plastic wrist band.  I remember having that “farmer’s tan” of sorts from having no sun exposure on my wrist.  I remember replacing those tiny batteries that were never easy to get to.  And, the most annoying part, I remember having to set the time… MANUALLY.

Image by alexkerhead via Flickr

My days of wrist watch wearing did finally come to an end.  It was probably with my first cell phone.  Man, the cell phone just makes everything easier, doesn’t it?  Time isn’t just kept, it’s held in the palm of your hand!  No nuisance of strapping something to your wrist.  No changing tiny batteries!  And no manually setting the time!  Cell phones even change with daylight savings time!  Basically, we carry them around anyway so there’s no reason to having a separate time-keeping device taking up space in your life!

This is really not all that new, cell phones have been in the hands of the everyday person for quite some time.  In fact, it dawned on me the other day how pervasive they have actually become in today’s culture.  Today, ANYONE can afford to carry some type of cell phone.  These days, even those who abhor technology, the Internet, and almost anything electronic (you know the type) break down and carry cell phones, whether or not they know how to use them!  The purpose of this post is just to give a proverbial “farewell” to the age of the watch and to give the well belated “welcome” to the age of our beloved digital pocket watch, the cell phone!

Image via Wikipedia

Am I off my rocker?  Let me know!  Do you wear a watch and are offended by my opinion?  Let me know!  I don’t care, I’ll probably just delete the comment anyway (just kidding, of course)!

SPAM on SPAM Sandwhich anyone?

A while back I did a post all about the types of email SPAM out there and how to deal with them.  The funniest thing happened!  Recently I received three separate comments on that particular post that, as it turns out, are SPAM themselves!  Check it out:

How do I know they are SPAM?  You tell me.

How to choose who to work on your computer

A while back I wrote an article for MakeUseOf.com titled 5 Sites To Learn How To Repair Your Own Computer.  In it I complain about the repair prices of the “big box stores.”  Well, as it turns out I found an interesting video depicting some investigative reporting done on the topic of PC repair.  Check it out for yourself:

This kind of stuff happens quite a bit.  For instance, in the article I wrote, I also mentioned someone I knew who had a virus removed and anti-virus software installed for several hundred dollars.  Well, something similar happened to a family member this week.  Let me explain.

It started when the family dog chewed and damaged the cord to a laptop.  The computer continued to work properly with the damaged cord so they just continued using it.  Suddenly there was smoke so they stopped using it and brought it in to Best Buy to see what kind of damage there was.  After plugging the laptop in with the damaged cord and attempting to turn it on with no response, they had a suggested diagnosis.  They said they could have it sent away at the cost of $35 but that it would probably be a waste.  They thought the motherboard was fried and that the cost of repair would add up to more than the cost of a new laptop.

As someone who has worked on and at computers for years, there was a few obvious things they didn’t think to do before jumping to the “time to replace” spiel.  One of those steps was to try using a CORD THAT WASN’T DAMAGED!  Forgive me if I sound haughty when I refer to that as obvious.

In this situation I was able to step in and save my family from impending unnecessary spending, but not everyone has someone close who can help.  Here are a few tips to help you find someone or someplace that you can trust to work on your computer in situations when you can’t fix it yourself.

(1) Ask around

If you are trying to find someone you can trust, ask people you trust for referrals.  The key here is obvious, if you are looking for advice you can trust, ask someone you KNOW you can trust!  Do you know other people with a computer?  These days almost everyone does.  One tip would to not ask someone who does NOT even have a computer; odds are they won’t have good advice about them.  Ask other people you know and trust who they go to and their experiences.  At least that is a good place to start.

(2) Look for reviews

After asking around you’ll hopefully have a few options to choose from.  Once you have that list to work from, you can then look up those references and see what kind of reviews they have.  There are several places online you can go to find business reviews.

One place I go to is Google, more specifically Google Maps.

I just search for the city and state, click the arrow, and click “search nearby.”  OR you can run a search such as: “computer repair loc: CITY, STATE.”  In the balloon you’ll find a link for reviews.

Another good site to search is the Better Business Bareau.

The BBB’s website not only lists businesses registered with them, but also other businesses.  It lists pertinent information like owner’s name, addresses, phone numbers, possible complaints, etc.  Its worth a shot.

There are also other good sites to find reviews.  Do some research and find out what people are saying.  Get a consensus of the “crowd.”

(3) Ask good questions

There are a few questions you should ask the computer technician before handing over your computer for repair (from About.com – PC Repair):

1. How much do you charge per hour?
2. Can You Tell Me How Many Billable Hours This Might Take to Fix?
3. Do You Have a Minimum Charge?
4. Should I Expect Any Charges Other Than the Hourly Rate? (I’d be specific and also ask if there is a fee for diagnosis)
5. Do You Charge Extra For In-Home/Business Service?
6. Do You Guarantee Your Service?
7. When Might I Be Able to Pick Up My Computer?

On a similar note, you also should be able to explain the issue thoroughly to the technician.  A good thorough explanation of the issue with give you the best odds of getting the issue resolved.  Check out this About.com article titled: How to Describe Your Problem to a Computer Repair Professional.  I also asked a group of computer techies some questions including what kind of things they like people to do BEFORE seeking help.  Check out the interview series.

What tips do you have for someone looking for a good computer repair service?  I’m sure someone can add something to this list!

How do you locate email messages in your inbox?

Physical manifestation of what my email inbox would look like

If you are anything like me, you have tons of email.  If you are a user of one of those web-mail sites like Gmail or Hotmail where you have tons of space, you may not even delete old email messages (with Gmail’s archiving option, why would you need to?).  For instance, in my old Hotmail inbox I currently have 3119 messages and most of them I have no intention of going back to organize them any time soon.

This brings up the question of this post: How do YOU organize your email messages so you can go back to find them when you need them?

Many webmail sites use folders that you can set up in order to organize your messages by topic or importance.  You can either drag and drop your messages into the appropriate folders or you can set up filters to automatically send them there.  Gmail uses a different, but similar, but much more flexible system with what they call tags instead of folders.  This way messages can have several different tags and therefore they can be in several different categories at the same time.  Either way, there is always a way to organize those email messages.

You’ll also notice that most webmail sites also have an email search box.  This way if you are looking for a very specific email in a very disorganized inbox (cough, cough!), all you have to do is type in a few search terms and you’ll hopefully find the message without an issue.  In fact, if a message in Gmail is archived, it is removed from the inbox altogether but it’ll still show up for searches.  When I began to hear that people are beginning to lose patience with organization tools and are beginning to rely on searches to find their long lost email messages, I began to not feel as guilty about my own jumbled up mess of an email inbox!

OK, so come clean!  How do you go about finding those lost emails from 5 years ago that you never thought you’d ever need?  Let me know, I could use the help!