The Best Ways To De-Stink Your Stuff 
In Memoriam: Our Favourite Apps And Services That Have Gone Belly Up 
How To Prepare For A Move Overseas 
From Saucy Pics To Passwords: How To Share Sensitive Information 
How Do IKEA's Prices In Australia Compare? 
New flybuys Earns Discounts Faster (But They're Not Good Discounts) The Oz-developed online reminder tool Remember the Milk has added Milk Sync – a tool which allows you to synch Remember the Milk with the Windows Mobile task application of your Smartphone or PocketPC device. Features include Two way synchronisation (or optionally RTM to device, or device to RTM), Over The Air (OTA) or cradle sync, scheduled synchronisation (e.g., automatically sync every hour, or when the device is placed in cradle), the ability to include all lists or specific lists from RTM in sync. The catch is that its only available to paid users of Remember the Milk, so it will set you back $US25 a year. (Is it just me, or is it a little cheeky to offer a paid subscription for a Beta service?) I’ve used Remember the Milk as a standalone, online repository for my to-do lists but I’d be interested to hear if any readers are Pro users how they find the Milk Sync feature. Thanks for the tip, Korian!
Congratulations to the winners of our Pixar competition – Damian, Neil, John, Dan and Alan have each won a double pass to the Pixar: 20 Years of Animation exhibition showing at ACMI in Melbourne until 14 October.
They won for submitting their best photography or animation tips – which you can read here.
Previously mentioned My Maps—the customisable map tool built into Google Maps—now lets you add your own custom icons to maps using any JPG, GIF, BMP, or PNG image on the internet. I didn’t give My Maps all that much of a look when it first launched this April, but after giving it a second glance, it has to be the best tool available online for creating robust, personalised maps, and the custom icons just adds to its customisable flair—especially now that you can easily embed your maps in any web page. Google Maps is one Google product that continues to amaze, rolling out one useful feature after another (in contrast to you, Gmail).
Google Maps [via Mashable]If you’ve ever sat endlessly at a red light because your motorcycle, scooter, or bicycle doesn’t have the conductive juice to trigger the traffic light change, DIY site Instructables suggests that a small magnet attached to the bottom of your vehicle will do the trick every time. If anyone’s ever tried this out, let us know how it worked for you in the comments.
Trigger GREEN Traffic Lights [Instructables]If you’re setting up the ultimate home office but you don’t want to shell out the cash for a klunky, outdated fax machine, you probably don’t need to. When I started working from home, I used free fax-from-your-computer options like FaxZero, but there are limitations to free faxes and in general they’re somewhat of a pain. Over time, I started returning fax requests as scanned PDFs attached to emails with a note along the lines of “I attached the document as a PDF. If you still need it faxed, please let me know.” So far most have actually been happier with PDFs. You do need a scanner, of course, but they’re a lot more multi-purpose than the fax machine. I am curious, though: Is the PDF attachment a successful replacement for the fax (even when faxes are requested), and is the fax finally dead (and if not, why not)? Let’s hear your thoughts in the comments.
Google has quietly introduced a new app of sorts called Shared Stuff, a social bookmarking service offering a strange balance of Google Bookmarks, del.icio.us, and Google Reader shared feeds with a heavy dose of Gmail integration. You can add items to your Shared Stuff with the bookmarklet at the Shared Stuff homepage. The service integrates with your Google account and Gmail contacts so that, for example, when you go to the Shared Stuff homepage you’ll see shared stuff from your Gmail contacts (which sounds like a potential headache, since Gmail saves all of your contacts).
According to Weblog HealthMad, the right spices can alleviate pains (especially upset stomachs!), keep you calm, relax your muscles, and fight disease—plus, you know, add flavour to any meal. Thanks, Matt!
Blogger Ron Schenone insists that the desktop computer is no longer needed to run heavy software, since laptops are nearly if not just as capable as most desktops on the market. Add to that the portability, small footprint and dramatic price drops for good laptops, and Schenone wonders why any normal user should buy a full desktop computer. So what I’d like to know is: 1) What are you using right now? and 2) Which would you purchase right now? Hit the link to give us your answers.
Don’t have any matches or a lighter on hand but just happen to have fine steel wool and a 9-volt battery? Rub ‘em together and you’ve got fire. The likelihood that you are without matches or any sort of lighter but that you do have steel wool and a battery on hand seems slim, but either way this is a great bit of MacGyver ingenuity.
How to make fire without matches or a lighter [5min]
