Editor's Picks: What We Like
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Be a Friend Fiend With FriendFeed
Your brother just posted his vacation photos on Flickr. Your friend then “favorited” a YouTube video for you to watch. And now your mother is sharing a new recipe on Google Reader. There’s always something happening online, and sometimes managing your digital life gets a little overwhelming.
With FriendFeed, you can conveniently manage all your accounts from one place. FriendFeed breaks down the walls between Web sites such as Digg, Facebook and Flickr, and allows you to view everything from one Web page.
According to a TechCrunch article, “It’s a simple product that, like a ton of sleepy competitors, is trying to help people organize user data stored across a myriad of social networks. But unlike those competitors, FriendFeed’s simple approach may be the way to win.”
The site was founded by four former Google employees — Bret Taylor, Jim Norris, Paul Buchheit and Sanjeev Singh — who had a hand in the launch of Google Maps and in the creation of Gmail. The best part about this site is that it’s always getting better, as improvements are constantly being made. Now if only they had a service like this for real life…
On-the-Go: The Next Frontier
It’s the journey and not the destination that matters most in life, right? Well, with all of the tech developments in store for cars these days, your most productive moments may indeed occur during the ride.
This year’s International Consumer Electronics Show, held in January, highlighted a number of such “in-car computing” gadgets, according to a CNN.com article. For instance, this spring, Ford is expected to release a fully functional dashboard computer with a keyboard so professionals can go online, access documents and log inventory while on the road. And AT&T will introduce an in-car entertainment service with 22 satellite TV channels.
If you’re worried that all those new options will keep drivers’ attention away from the road, there’s also plenty of new technology geared toward safety. Hyundai, for example, created a built-in system to warn motorists if they drift out of their lanes, while another manufacturer developed a pedestrian-detection feature that alerts drivers when its thermal-imaging camera senses human-shaped heat sources. At this rate, cars may one day drive themselves!
In any case, it’s evident that we are about to witness many exciting new ways to make on-the-go computing possible.
Eco-Drive
In the past, bamboo has served a variety of purposes — from wood flooring to window shades, from culinary delights to medicinal treatments. But storage solution provider Fabrik has come up with yet another use: external hard drive.
The [re]drive Turbo USB 2.0 External Hard Drive is a tree hugger’s dream come true. According to the product Web site, [re]drive is encased in a unique mixture of recycled aluminum and bamboo, uses less energy to run and has a power-sensor feature that prompts it to turn on and off in sync with your computer. And it even comes packaged in recycled materials.
In addition, the 500 GB [re]drive is both PC and Mac compatible and comes with free support and a one-year warranty. You also get an additional 2 GB of online backup storage and Fabrik’s backup software.
What more could an eco-conscious computer lover ask for?
