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Top 10 Pervasive Tech Myths That Are Only Wasting Your Time Already spent enough cash to put that iPhone or iPod touch under the tree that you’re not bouncing with excitement at the idea of dropping more cash on a video stand… and you love origami? With Swiss photographer Enrique Pardo’s dollar bill stand for the iPhone or iPod touch video you can roll your own DIY stand with nothing more than a dollar-bill-shaped piece of paper. Pardo uses a Benjamin for his stand, but you won’t think I’m crazy to suggest you could use a twenty or even (gasp!) a one dollar bill. And if you’re giving one of these hot gadgets this holiday season, why not throw in a cheap little stand (there’s also the comparatively simple business card stand) and put your.gift over the top?
The $100 iPhone/iPod Touch Stand Made from a Piece of Paper [Gizmodo]Author Tim Ferriss says he takes notes “like some people take drugs,” filling paper notebooks with book highlights, ideas, dream descriptions, lists, brainstorming, contacts, questions, and anything else he wants to remember. Ferriss writes: I trust the weakest pen more than the strongest memory, and note taking is—in my experience—one of the most important skills for converting excessive information into precise action and follow-up.
Then he describes how he chooses, indexes, and organizes his paper notebooks, using size and flexibility plus hand-written page numbers to find what he needs later.
While I love the idea of taking thorough, well-organized notes consistently (and I try to do just that), I don’t see myself either flipping through paper notebooks a year from now or transcribing my scribbling to digital documents as I go. How do you take notes while you read books, attend seminars, and go to meetings? Let us know in the comments. Students, see more on how to take study-worthy notes with the Cornell note-taking method.
How to Take Notes Like an Alpha-Geek [The Blog of Author Tim Ferriss via Micro Persuasion]Windows/Mac/Linux: The OpenOffice.org2GoogleDocs extension imports documents from Google Docs and Spreadsheets to OpenOffice.org and exports from OO.org to GDocs so you can work with your docs both online and off as you see fit. Whether you’re primarily a Google Docs or OO.org fan, this desktop-to-web integration seems like an excellent way to take your docs with you whether you’re online or off, and if nothing else is a quick and simple way to backup your local documents to the internet. The OpenOffice.org2GoogleDocs extension is free, works anywhere you’ve installed OpenOffice.org (Windows, Mac, or Linux). Web site DocSyncer is looking to do similar things for your Microsoft Office docs, but right now it’s in an invite-only beta. OO.org2GDocs is here right now.
OpenOffice.org2GoogleDocs [OpenOffice.org Extensions]Disney CEO Bob Iger shares a few tidbits about how his typical workday goes with Fortune magazine. He gets up at 4:30 a.m., exercises regularly and he eschews the chauffeur and drives himself to work so he has a little extra privacy. He’s also a stickler for punctual meetings: My day needs to be managed like clockwork. If people are late for meetings, the meetings tend to go late, which throws off my agenda thereafter. I frequently start the meeting even if all the people expected to be in attendance aren’t there. I don’t need to say to people, “Be on time.” They know.
Oh, to be the CEO! See how more business gurus—like Google’s Marissa Mayer and designer Vera Wang—work.
How I work: Disney’s Bob Iger [Fortune via Micro Persuasion]Video weblog Unwired explains how to browse the internet anonymously with The Onion Router network (commonly known as Tor). We’ve covered anonymous browsing with Tor in the past, but this Unwired explanation features a nice introduction to how Tor works and how to get started with Tor using the TorButton Firefox extension. Concerned about privacy at work? Check out more ways to bolster your browsing privacy on the job.
Using the Onion Router network [Unwired]iGoogle lovers looking to get in the holiday spirit might want to install the iGoogle winter theme by pasting a simple bit of JavaScript into your address bar next time you visit iGoogle.
Want your very own web site address, but don’t want to mess with pay-for hosting packages or server configuration? Today you can buy a domain name for around 10 bucks a year (or less) and map it to a variety of free web-based apps for no-mess and no-cost hosting. Typical commercial web hosting starts at around $100 a year and comes with clunky webmail and apps you have to set up yourself. Instead, you can have a full-featured web site with multiple spacious email accounts, blog or static web page hosting, and other services for free. You don’t have to lease server space or run your own server to have your own URL. Let’s take a look at how you can set up a complete domain name backend for free.
See less chrome and more web page in Firefox by combining your toolbars onto the same line. The How-To Geek tech site describes how, using an extension or just by repositioning the fox’s toolbars by right-clicking and choosing “Customize.” Want to utilise every single pixel in Firefox? Check out how we consolidate Firefox’s chrome with several configuration and style tweaks. Conserve Space in Firefox by Combining Toolbars [the How-To Geek]
Ah, the holidays—the only time of year the boss ponies up for an open bar and your co-workers get drunk and stupid together after hours. The Dumb Little Man weblog details how to avoid slinking into your cubicle humiliated and hungover the day after the company holiday party. All of this is common sense advice that may seem unnecessary, but a reality check before you face all that free eggnog, holiday cheer, and that cutie three cubicles down dressed to the nines might help. How do you enjoy yourself with your co-workers at the holiday party without losing your job? Tell us in the comments. Avoid Ending your Career at the Holiday Party [Dumb Little Man]
Tired of having an over-stuffed wallet and paying too many credit card bills each month? Personal finance blog The Simple Dollar has a few suggestions on which cards to keep and which to start cancelling over time. It’s not as simple as cutting all of them up except one, as the post points out: Which is your oldest card? That card is the one that has the longest credit history, which is important for your credit report. For me, my oldest card is one that I got as a freshman in college. It has an atrocious “bonus” program associated to it (1/4% return in the form of “points”), but it was the first one I had and thus it’s been on my credit report for more than a decade, establishing that I’ve had positive credit for a long while.
Rather than keep the card in his wallet, however, the author simply locks it away in a safe, so the good credit hits keep coming every month. How did you decide which credit card gets the prime slot in your wallet? Share your wisdom in the comments. Photo by mlinksva.
I Have A Wallet Full Of Credit Cards – Which Ones Should I Keep? [The Simple Dollar]
