Google Voice FTW

Hi all!

I think I mentioned Google Voice some time ago. It seems to be working real well and so far I have only heard one complaint about a voice mail giving a weird response.

If you do not have Google Voice but think you may want to try it you have to request an invite.  http://google.com/voice

What does it do…

Google Voice is a Centralized Voice-mail system. You can assign many phones to forward all missed calls directly to a single voicemail in-box. You can access these voice-mails on your phone like normal (with a new number to dial). You can also access these voicemails on the internet.

The Voice-mails once received into the Google servers are transcribed into the language of your choice. The transcriptions are not yet perfect but it almost always gets numbers and clearly enunciated words correctly. This is especially nice when you can just click a button and create a new contact with as much of the vital information as can be taken from the transcription. Of course you can listen to the original recording and like Network cell voice-mail the recordings will be saved for only 14 days. That is unless you save it separately which is easy to do.

Really the best part about it is the ability to access everything on the web. If you already have a Gmail account an if you’re using Google contacts the transition is easy and simple.

Another nice point is that if you get the free for life google phone number you can easily send and receive sms messages from the computer keyboard. These message just so happen to get stored in thread form for easy reading and archival.

With or without a Google number you can also dial a number to call someone on a separate phone. So you want to call your Auntie Em? You simple goto your Gmail contacts and select Auntie Em’s listing. Next to her number will be a call button. When you press this call button a dialog comes up and asks you which phone you wish to call from.  On my setup I can use either “My Cell Phone” or “My MagicJack”. You just select which phone you want to use and check if you want to save the settings. Clicky Clicky and Google voice will call the phone you selected, when you answer the phone it automatically dials out the correct number you wanted to call.

I think it is very cool, especially if your one of those people that is in front of a computer more often than not.

Almost Free Telecommunications

Hi All,

Long story short, Last week my iPhone was stolen from my car. My fault for thinking my neighborhood and more specifically my neighbors would not steal something from my vehicle directly in front of my hose. I have replaced my iPhone with the least expensive, no contract phone I could get and boy is it small, cheap and featureless. OK well that got long…

Anyways it made me do some thinking about my telecommunications. For those of you that have an iPhone you are stuck with not only the rates for your calling plan but also an additional $40 a month for data access. For me this came to just under $80 monthly. $80 just to have a cell phone? I know I am a bit old but it was not all that long ago when phone companies only charged you less than $20 a month for your house phone.

Well, I have had enough so I am changing up. My company advertising, flyers, business cards and Truck all have my cell phone number on them. I have 4 months remaining with my contract for AT&T and then I get to change up.

Currently my plan is to get a mobile hotspot ( MyFi or similar), they cost about the same as a normal Cell phone charge of $50 a month. I will be dropping my cell phone into a blender and sending it back to AT&T just for some giggles.

Once I have the mobile hotspot I will be able to take my Netbook with me anywhere and have internet access. With that access I will be using my MagicJack and a headset to make any calls I need to make on the road or in the house. Once I do this I will take my cell phone number and have it directly forwarded to Google Voice.

Google Voice is like a consolidated voice mail box for any and all of your numbers. It will let me goto the internet site and listen to my voicemails and even let me call out with the click of a button. The best feature is that when a voicemail gets recorded it automatically gets transcribed into English text. You can listen to the recording or read the text (transcription is not all that great yet). Then if you want to call the person that called you there is a button to call the number.

The best part is that Google Voice will dial your phone (magicjack) than dial out the number so everything is free! all you need is internet access and MagicJack.

The MagicJack website where you can get the device for just a few dollars ($12) a year and it allows you to call anywhere in the US for FREE! and only $.02 a min overseas. The drawback is that you need internet access. Note: there are plenty of free wireless hot spots these days for those that do not have internet at home or do not want to purchase and pay for a wireless hotspot.

Google Voice is free but you need to sign up and request access because it is still in the beta phase.

The best part about this all is that I will not only have mobile phone access, but also Internet data access all for one low monthly price.

Must See Video PIXELS

PIXELS, Have you seen it? it’s pretty cool, very imaginative and for us old timers quite nostalgic.  It features all our old heroes and villains for those 8-bit games from the past.

Really it is a must see if you have ever played any of those destructive video games that are killing the minds of our youths with destruction and mayhem and slaughter.
Oh wait I like video games,  you did not read that last sentence /waving hand like a jedi or something.

Really it is a must see video or did I say that already?

OK Here it is

Can you name all the games represented?

Building a space station, Internationally

I am sure we all remember the early days of the International Space Station…

Zarya was the first module sent to space, designed by NASA built by Russia.. Remember hearing about Zarya?

The First American built section was Unity. Remember hearing about Unity?

I thought so, do you remember hearing about these sections, What about Kibo or PIRs?

Me either…

Someone has put together an excellent annotated video showing the progress of building the Space Station. I find it really cool and super informative, you should check it out!

Check it out HERE

EN-V Envy?

Here we go with General Motors latest romp into the electric vehicle. The EN-V -pronounced as Envy, is based on an ultra-lightweight design. With a top speed of 24mph it could be the perfect inner city commuter.

We even have the technology to make it truly autonomous but would you allow a car to drive you around town?

With a foot print of 5×5 it’s small enough to park in your hallway or a small shed. = Easy to store in your Apartment.

Since it’s electric I can see the feasibility of actually having access inside buildings for parking. = Faster to destination.

Since it is very light weight a simple parking elevator could be designed. = Cheaper parking charges

General Motors is working with Segway Inc. to make this Two-Seated, Two-Wheeled, Zero-Emission vehicle a reality. Based on the Segway Puma (Personal Urban Mobility and Accessibility) the research has been going on for a long time.

There is a really good read over at The Huffington Post and the GM website press release has some info and if you search  GM.COM you can find more. There are a bunch of Images over at the GM site but some are awfully silly looking some look pretty cool.

If I lived in the city I think something like this would be very useful but then I really like small cars.

Synergy

OMG Synergy FTW

So any of you geeks still using a keyboard mouse switch? If you don’t need to switch the monitor there is a great program out there Synergy. Synergy is a virtual mouse and keyboard switcher program that does not require a key press.

If you have 2 monitors (or more) you can set it up simply to switch your current mouse just by gesturing over to the second screen (second computer) just as if it was a second monitor on your single machine.

It also has a shared clipboard so you can actually copy some text from one computer, mouse over to the second computer and paste the text.

If you have multiple monitors on your desk hooked up to multiple monitors, you need Synergy.

http://synergy2.sourceforge.net/

You simply set up the machine with the physical connection to the mouse and keyboard you want to use as “Server” then configure the other machines as clients. You can set it up by Machine name, aliases and/or IP#’s.

Oh the best part… Windows, Mac, Ubuntu and more!

Multiple Monitors?

When it comes to multiple monitors, how many are too many? Are 5 too many? Maybe 10 are too many?

I would have to Guess that 40 are way too many!.

From Gizmoto, The 40 Display home office or Missile Launching Facility?

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