Making plans is hard, especially when you're making them with a chronic flaker. There are ways to politely cancel plans, but what if the person you're making plans with repeatedly doesn't show up? To save you time and frustration, MEL Magazine gave some advice on dealing with flaky people.

It's good to have backup plans in case your goals don't work out in your career or life. However, if you spend too much effort on figuring out the details of your backup plans, it can make you less likely to really pursue your first plan.

Long-term goals are overwhelming. You want to get a good job, lose weight, raise your kids right, and get rich. Good luck getting all that done by tomorrow. Instead, just focus on today.

Woodworking is a skill that you can take as far as you want. The more you learn, the more complex projects you'll be able to tackle. But no matter your skill level, your project can always benefit from plans someone else has made. Here's how to find plans for just about any project online.

Virgin Mobile has added a plan designed to lure customers away from rival networks with double data alongside its data rollover offer.

Anyone who wanted to pre-order an iPhone 6 or 6 Plus ahead of last week's launch didn't just have to grapple with sites that constantly crashed, a shortage of models and a sense of unhelpful panic. They also had to deal with phone plans that are confusing, inconsistent and constantly changing.

One of the jobs of the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) is to track whether phone companies and internet service providers are meeting regulatory requirements. Today, it announced it had issued formal warnings to 39 providers for not meeting basic requirements around paperwork and customer information. That would make us cautious about using any of them.

Dear Lifehacker, A friend of mine recently acquired a new phone and had to get a new SIM in the right size. That made me wonder: why do we still use SIM cards? American CDMA phones are SIM-less, so are there any specific reasons why SIM cards are still needed here?

Optus has revamped its pay-as-you-use and monthly prepaid plans. Here's our assessment of what's on offer.

Hey Lifehacker, I have friends with two young teenagers (11 and 13) who are screaming for their own mobile phones. The parents are concerned about cost overruns, particularly with data limits. What they are looking for is a plan (preferably pre-paid) that has a "real" data limit. If the use gets to that limit then the connection is either shaped or cut off. No risk of excess data charges and parents don’t have to worry about a surprise bill. Any suggestions?

Dear Lifehacker, I've seen a lot of advertising for Vaya recently. The plans seem good value, but from what I've read the company has rubbish customer service. Do you think they're any good?

If you don't carefully track your data usage, you can easily end up paying for a phone plan that has more data than you actually need. Vodafone is offering a workaround of sorts with its new Data Workout option, which lets you essentially use unlimited data for the first two months so you can calculate your needs.

Last October, Telstra put up the access charges on its non-bundled home telephone plans. Come this November, it's going to do that again.

Internode has boosted the data quota for customers on its Easy Broadband and Easy Bundle plans. The new plans feature up to 40GB of extra data per month at no extra cost.

data across a number of mobile devices".

iiNet has flipped the switch on its 4G plans running on the Optus 4G network, so how much can you expect to pay per month?

I was never much one for sending lots of texts, but I know I'm very much in a minority on that score. If you do spend a lot of money on SMS messages, Vodafone's latest offer may appeal.

While it isn't actually the first provider to offer untimed mobile calls (goTalk's VOIP plans have a similar feature), Optus' new Timeless bundles do offer a cheap option if you make lots of calls to mobile numbers. Of particular note given the ongoing debate over iPhone plans is the $129 bundle, which includes 2GB of data and an all-you-can-call policy for $129 -- a much better deal than the iPhone's $149 1GB launch plan on Optus. If nothing else, this is yet another reminder that signing up early for the iPhone was always like to be a costly decision.

It might still be seeking outside help to sell iPhones, but 3 is launching a new series of phone plans in Australia which offer something we'll predict the new iPhone plans won't: video content for free. The plans, which go on sale from July 3 and range between $29 and $199, include the usual features (fixed value for voice and SMS calls) but also include a "selection" of free content in one of three categories: News (including ABC, Sky News, News Limited and Fairfax), Sport (including some of the news brands plus Foxtel and Sportal) or Fun (Project Runway and various other TV projects). This isn't quite the all-you-can-eat data found overseas (or even in the more basic 3 X Series plans), but it's still a good step forward, and a neat way to get into 3G video without costly subscriptions.