Thursday, May 23, 2013

The Best Email Site: "Gmail" or "Yahoo!"?

  
     From the time I was around ten years old, I've had various email addresses I've used for signing up for profiles and other things. My first email address was made using Yahoo!, but this was before I even knew what Gmail was. My parents had Yahoo! email addresses and I followed suit.

       Years later, after having two Yahoo! emails for a few years, I kept hearing about Gmail. I was wondering more and more what it was, so I made an account, and let it sit for a while. My Yahoo! emails had been compromised after a few months, and I was forced to go back to Gmail.

       To this day, Gmail is the only email provider I'll ever use. Gmail is faster in loading and uploading than Yahoo!, integrated into YouTube and Google+ accounts, and is right on the most popular search engine's website. I love how quickly Gmail updated instantly and automatically scans emails to see if they should be included in Spam filtered folders, thereby clearing up you're inbox on it's own.

       If you don't have a Gmail email address, I recommend trying it out. It's free, easy to sign up for, and quite beneficial. Gmail seems to be a step ahead of other providers like AOL, Hotmail (does anyone still use this?), and Yahoo!. It's definitely on the cutting edge, and sure to please you as it does many of it's other hundred-thousands of users.

Sunday, November 18, 2012

Chrome or Firefox: Which is the better browser?


When you open your laptop for some evening internet browsing, what are you clicking on? Google Chrome is currently the most popular browser in the world, but why? Both Chrome and Firefox offer fast, effective internet usage, but what makes one better than its competitors?

What are they?

Firefox (a browser run by Mozilla), according to its website, is "the highly popular free web browser that more than 450 million people worldwide are using to surf and interact with the Internet. Firefox is available for Linux, Mac, Windows, handheld devices, and in more than 70 different languages. You may currently be using Internet Explorer, but Firefox is faster which means that you don't waste time waiting for web pages to load. With a strong focus on your online security, Firefox helps to protect your personal information and activities from being seen and exploited while you surf the Internet. Firefox is well known for being the most customizable web browser. With a selection of more than 8,000 free add-ons on the Firefox Add-ons site, you can customize Firefox to have it look the way that you want, and function the way that you want."

Basically it is a free internet browser available in many languages, and has many free add-ons, or widgets, you can customize it with. To read more on Mozilla Firefox, you can visit their website at www.mozilla.org.

Chrome (a browser run by Google), is "designed to be fast in every possible way. It's quick to start up from your desktop, loads web pages in a snap, and runs complex web applications lightning fast. Chrome's browser window is streamlined, clean and simple. For example, you can search and navigate from the same box and arrange tabs however you wish -- quickly and easily. 
Chrome is designed to keep you safer and more secure on the web with built-in malware and phishing protection, auto-updates to make sure you have all the latest security fixes, and more" 

Again, Chrome is another free internet browser many people use everyday to surf the internet. It is an easy-to-use browser, that has a clean and simple look to it. It is safe and secure, and it has built in protection from viruses and other malware. To read more on Google Chome, you can go to www.google.com/chrome.

Which one is faster?

According to my research, the various sites of the internet seem to agree that Google Chrome opens and operates faster than its counterpart, Firefox. They both are not slow by any means, but sometimes it's a matter of a few seconds to some people.

Which one has a better design?

They are similar in design, but Google Chrome offers personal customization in its settings feature. You can pick out of hundreds of possible designs, allowing your browser to show your personality. Firefox does not advertise any ways to do so.

Overall

I think Google Chrome is a great browser. It is good for quick internet surfing and for customization, and has an easier feel to it. It hardly ever crashes, yet to do things like clear your history, you have to go into a whole new page and it takes a bit longer. Although I like Google Chrome, I always find myself using Firefox, because it seems to me that many websites look better and work better on that browser.
Being a student, I have many online textbooks and websites I need to be able to load, and some are just not supported by Google Chrome, making Firefox my go to browser.

To Download
To download Google Chrome, go to www.google.com/chrome, click on "Download Chrome", and follow the on screen instructions.

To download Mozilla Firefox, go to www.mozilla.org, click "Firefox Free Download" and follow the on screen instructions.

Thursday, November 1, 2012

Does Guest Blogging and Commenting Still Drive Traffic?

If you blog, you've probably heard that guest blogging and commenting on others blogs are the bread and butter to your traffic, at least at first. The concept comes from the want to get your name out there. In the early days of blogging, that was the easiest and best way. You wrote a post, someone commented, and you went to their blog and checked it out.

Now, hundreds and thousands of blogs exist, and are all fighting to be the best of the best. Sometimes it's hard to know which blogs to comment on to bring in traffic, and which you will get buried under hundreds of other comments with. You have to find a happy medium.

With guest blogging, you need to find a website that somehow pertains to your topic, has a good amount of traffic and viewership, but isn't flooded with other guest posts that will make it harder to get noticed. It's all about getting your name out so more people recognize your name.

Guest blogging does work if you know where to go. Some websites doesn't openly offer about it, but sending them an email usually can get you an answer pretty fast. You need to write your best work when posting a guest blog, because if you don't, no one will come back to your blog. Readers want quality, reliable content they can use.

Commenting can work, but you have to again be professional about it. As I mentioned in my post "Five Easy Ways To Get More Readers on Your Blog", I talked about commenting. Instead of a quick "Great Post!", try writing something like how you agree with parts of the article, and what you thought while reading it. Don't be afraid to disagree. When other readers see an intelligent comment with a link a the end, they may be more inclined to check out your blog.

How do you use guest blogging and commenting on your blog to drive in viewers?

Wednesday, October 24, 2012

Why is Blogging So Popular?

It's estimated that there are over
31 million bloggers in the U.S. alone.
As of 2012, there are over 170 million blogs in the world. In 2013, there are estimated to be a total of about 141.6 million people who read blogs daily. This is a growing industry, with a booming market, and it's becoming more popular everyday.

Why is that?

What drives you to crank out another post, even when you've got many other things on your mind? What is it about a certain blog that has you coming back close to everyday? Each persons personal answer is different, but usually it can come down to a few things. You either love it and you are passionate about writing or reading, it's a pass time for you, or you're just interesting in the specific material the blog offers.

A blog is a website that is more personal. Blogging is a form of personal expression. Static webpages can over information and reader's delight, also, but a blog is something entirely different. A blog is reading the thoughts of the author, or connecting with the author on a regular basis. You can feel what they feel on a subject through the words they type and you can get their opinions. You become closer to the author in a way, because you get to see them change and see what is on their mind during certain time periods.

That's why I think blogging is a increasingly popular market. It's the relation, and the more first-hand experience you get as a reader. You know as a reader that the authors entire blog is dedicated to you, and without their loyal readers, they'd only be writing to themselves.

People open up new blogs everyday. Whether they live to see their first year or die in the first few days, people are interested in doing it at some point or another. Society is beginning to see the positive effects and wants to get it's inexperienced fingers on it. Yet, every famous blogger had a first post at some point. They weren't created superstars. They worked their way to the top of the ladder, and now it's someone else's turn for their shot in the limelight.

So whether you're a reader or a blogger, you know why blogging is a popular pass time or even career. As for others, they might soon find out.

Monday, October 22, 2012

Saving Battery Life on Your Apple Devices

If you have a phone, you probably know the feeling of trying to do as much as possible before it dies. Some phones just have really bad battery life, but with most phones there are things you can do to make it last longer. These methods work mostly on the iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch, but this also might work on other smartphones or tablets, too.

Turn Your Brightness Down

This is an obvious one, but sometimes it's overlooked, and it's one of your biggest battery-suckers. To do this, go to settings and to "Brightness and Wallpaper". You can easily slide the brightness up or down from here. You can choose whether you want your device to automatically adjust the brightness based on what it thinks the surrounding light levels are. You should notice longer lasting battery life.

Turn off Bluetooth if You Don't Need It

In your settings, you can choose "Bluetooth" and slide it to off. This will keep your phone from constantly searching for Bluetooth devices to connect to. This helps preserve your battery overtime.




Turn Off Unneeded Location Services

Does Angry Birds really need to know where you are during the day? Location services can be helpful in finding places on Apple Maps (Like the ocean) or using Google to find Restaurants near by. By going to settings, to privacy, to location services and disabling the service for apps who don't need it, you can save battery throughout the day. This also includes turning off Traffic, which is used to track you and see where there is more traffic in an area by number of iPhones there. You do this by going to settings, to privacy, to location services and scrolling down to System Services. Just leave Cell Network Search on, Compass Calibration if wanted, and Setting Time Zone if you want it to automatically change when you enter a new timezone.




Fetch Email instead of Push

Push for email helps by constantly checking if you have email coming in. To turn it off, go to settings, to "Mail, Contacts, Calendars" and configure your mail settings to fetch. Set it to the longest amount of time you can stand, but preferably make it Manual, so you must refresh it to receive new emails.

Turn Off Wifi

With Wifi constantly on (even when you're not using it) your device is constantly trying to connect to wifi's and searching for networks. By only turning it on when you need it, you can help preserve even more battery.




Have Your Device Set To Autolock More Frequently

By doing this, your device will not sit on standby for as long draining battery; it will instead lock and save you battery. You can do this by going to Setting, General, and to Auto-lock. You can there set the times for how long you want it to standby before locking.


By doing these things you should be able to have more battery on your Apple Device and be able to use it for longer. If you have any other suggestions you can leave them in the comments below. Do you think iOS 6 will affect battery life?

Tuesday, October 16, 2012

iPhone 4S: Why I Picked It

Does anyone still remember these?
This Monday was my birthday (Woo!) so to celebrate, I received the iPhone 4S on Saturday. It was an upgrade from my old LG Optimus S which I'd had to replace multiple times for screen problems. We got it from a Sprint Kiosk in our nearby mall, and I decided to let you know what I think of it after the first few days.

Right away I noticed how nice the phone was. That's what makes iPhone's so nice. They're easy to use and easy to navigate. If you've ever had an iPod touch then you've basically got it. It looked nice, and ran fast, and I really liked it.

Bad Battery Life

I realized fast that the battery life is pretty low. By the time I got home (a few hours) it was dead. I charged it all night and by about seven the next night it was dead again. And that was intermittently texting on it. If you're constantly doing things, you're going to run into trouble with it.

Call Quality

After getting it, I called a few people, and they complained of high pitched tones every few minutes. That could just be Sprint's fault or the phone, but I never had that problem before.

With my old phone I always had to speak loudly and clearly or the other person couldn't hear me. On the iPhone, I could whisper and they could clearly make out what I was saying.

The New iOS 6

Apple recently updated its software to iOS 6. It has a lot of new features, including an app called Passport that stores all your coupons and things. It updated the look of many things, and it's supposed to make it run faster. I don't like the way the new music app looks, because it's all white and plain. There were a few other differences that weren't big enough to make it to this post, but it's definitely not a game changer to me.

The Camera

I definitely noticed a difference in the iPhone 4S camera from the iPod Touch 4th Generation, which is what I used to use for all my picture taking. Pictures have noticeably more detail where you wouldn't expect it, and warmer colors. It's auto-focus is more advanced, and pictures just came out clearer.

Pictures off of my iPhone 4S:


(Birthday Cake!)

I think it was worth the $99 it cost. It's a pretty great phone, and I would recommend it. Do any of you have the 4S?

Saturday, October 13, 2012

50 Blog Posts I Wish You'd Write

In honor of Chris Brogans ever-popular "100 Topics I Hope YOU Write", I'd like to give my list of topics I hope to see one day in the blogosphere. Brogan's topics were more focused around Web 2.0 Tools and technology, but mine are all over the board.

Everyone has those moments when they just can't think of what to write about. Feel free to book mark this and come back to it when you need some inspiration or you're trying to battle writer's block.

But maybe out of the kindness of your hearts, you could throw a link my way?

Without further ado, here's my list of 50 Blog Posts I Wish You'd Write.

  1. Mac Verses PC: Which I Prefer
  2. Someone Who Has Changed My Life
  3. Why I Picked The Brand Name I Did
  4. How I Use Social Media
  5. Ways I've Increased My Blog Traffic
  6. What I Do Before I Write A Post
  7. One Show I Wish Was Still On TV
  8. My Favorite Foods to Serve During the Holidays
  9. The Best Present I Ever Got As A Child
  10. My Top Ten Websites I Use Everyday
  11. The Biggest Scams I've Fallen For
  12. Twenty Things I Wish I Knew When I Started My Blog
  13. Things That Have Changed Since My Childhood
  14. How I Wrote My First Blog Post
  15. My Firsts: Car, Job, and House
  16. Why I Decided to Join Facebook (Or Didn't)
  17. Blogger Verses WordPress: The Best Host
  18. A Restaurant in My Town that I Love
  19. My Favorite Fashion Trend From the '80's (or whatever generation)
  20. My Opinion of Michael Jackson
  21. How I Met My Spouse (Or Girlfriend... or cat)
  22. An Event that Changed My Life
  23. Why I'm Glad I Live in America
  24. My Favorite Pass-time as a Child
  25. What My iTunes Library Says About Me
  26. My Biggest Blogging Pet Peeve
  27. One Language I Wish I Had Learned
  28. How Twitter Has Brought Me More Viewers
  29. How I Use SEO in my Posts
  30. Twenty Things I Wish I Knew at Twenty
  31. Five Books that Changed Society
  32. Ways I Get More Subscribers
  33. My Top Five Favorite Blogs
  34. Why I Started Blogging
  35. The Biggest Mistakes You Can Make As A Blogger
  36. I Wish I Could Change This About Society
  37. My Biggest Fear
  38. My Favorite Thing About Blogging
  39. How I Use Craigslist
  40. What I Do in My Free Time
  41. How To Double Your Subscribers
  42. My Ideal Future
  43. Ten Things I Wish I Had
  44. Chrome or Firefox: Which is Better
  45. Nine Things I've Learned About the Internet
  46. My Opinion on the iPhone 5
  47. How to Save Battery Life on Your Phone
  48. My Opinion on Guest Bloggers
  49. My Inspirations for Writing
  50. Fifty Blog Posts I Wish You'd Write
Feel free to use any of these, or a variation on them. They're here to help you. 
But, you know, if your feeling generous, you could always throw a link back my way. I'd really appreciate it!

Whats your favorite thing to write about?

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