New Yahoo! Music: Listen from the Web

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The new Yahoo! Music has an great new function that allows you to listen from the web site to any of the 2 million+ tracks in their collection as long as the music is in a playlist. To enjoy this unlimited music on the web install the Firefox plugin on your PC. Here’s what Yahoo! says about the beta version of the plugin:

If you have a subscription to Yahoo! Music Unlimited and want to listen to your tracks in Firefox using the Yahoo! Media Player, you need to install this plug-in. It currently works with Yahoo! Music web playlists, but full-length playback may not be available on other pages of Yahoo! Music at present.

Let’s take a look at some screen shots:
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Donate Your Car and Get $500 Driving Credit

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Car Free DCzipcarlogo

If you’ve been thinking about going car-free in Washington, DC then this is an excellent time because you’ll give up an automobile and you’ll get something tangible back. Specifically you’ll get a free lifetime membership to Zipcar and $500 worth of driving credit. To be clear though, you’ve got to donate the car today or tomorrow, otherwise you’ll get a $100 driving credit.

I wish I had a car to donate!

For those who can’t give up a car you can still get involved:

If you don’t have a car to donate but want to help us celebrate our car donation drive, please join us for a FREE screening of National Geographic’s feature film Arctic Tale at Landmark’s E Street Cinema this Thursday, November 29.

[Car Donation Program: Go Gas-Guzzless! via Car Free DC]

Listen to Music Heard on iPod Ads

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Music of the iPod Ads

I don’t own an iPod but I do love discovering new music. If you love music and have enjoyed some of the songs featured on iPod ads you’re going to appreciate my playlist of songs featured in iPod and iPhone commercials.

Apple’s iPod Commercials Music, a playlist on Yahoo Music Jukebox

You don’t need an iPod to enjoy these songs. You can listen to 30-second samples from the web site or if you are a subscriber to Yahoo Music Jukebox you can listen to the full versions in near CD quality.

Don’t worry, I’m not keeping track of every song on every ad — that’s what Wikipedia is for. What I did do was take the list of tracks and make them easy to listen to.

Verizon Adds Service and Charges Without Consent

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Verizon logoVerizon Bill MistakeVerizon Order Cancellation

A couple of weeks ago I told you that I took my internet provider business from Comcast to Verizon hoping for better prices and service. I had my first hiccup with Verizon this week: the second bill arrived and it included charges for items that I did not order and never used.

The items that they were charging me $14.99 for were Verizon Security and Backup Bundle 5GB and Verizon Games on Demand Unlimited. I don’t know how Verizon thought it could place these items on my account without me asking for them. The good news is that the customer service representative did take those items off my account and credited my account on the current bill.

I’ve always heard that it is important to review bills for extraneous charges and this was the first time that I’ve noticed such a trick on my own bill. Let me know in the comments if you’ve been over charged by your internet service provider.

How to Forget Credit Cards and Save Money

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Paypal LogoGoogle Checkout LogoDiamonds from Blue Nile

Jewelery shops have been on my mind recently and I’m happy to see a way to save some money when I make my purchases. According to the New York Times yesterday, Jewelery retailers are looking for ways to reduce costs and one of those ways is to have people use methods of payment besides credit and debit cards. Goodbye Visa, hello Paypal and Google Checkout!

Starting Nov. 26, customers who buy with PayPal will save 20 percent on their purchases, with a maximum discount of $50.

I’m going to try it since it is just as convenient for me to pay with PayPal as it is to use my debit card. It’s a win-win situation for the retailer and for me! Let me know in the comments if you have other tips for saving money using the web and new banking technology.

[Retailers Explore New Ways of Being Paid]

29 Years Ago in National Geographic a Gorilla gets the Cover and Amanda is Born

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NGM_Oct1979In the basement of the National Geographic Society we keep a couple of large carts containing old issues of magazines. The issues there are random discards and are often a mix of English versions of NGM with local language editions from countries all over the world. I found there recently the October 1978 issue and I gave it to Amanda because it commemorates the month and year of her birth (hint hint, her birthday is coming up).

The cover itself is a photograph by Koko — it is a self portrait. If you look closely you can see the text is reversed because of the mirror.

What was amazing about it was that Amanda remembered the cover and the story from her childhood. I didn’t have a clue about Koko so that must show what a great memory Amanda has and how interested she was in National Geographic magazine as a child. How can I ever keep up? :)

This October cover of National Geographic magazine won an award from the American Society of Magazine Editors for being one of the top 40 magazine covers in the last 40 years. Here is an excerpt from the explanation of the win:

#37 (tie) National Geographic (October 1978)
This cover of National Geographic magazine is entitled “Conversations with a Gorilla,” with Koko the gorilla snapping a photograph of her reflection in the mirror. The photo was of such high quality and significance that it was chosen to be the cover photo for the October 1978 National Geographic article featuring Koko.

Just because a gorilla made the cover of the magazine doesn’t mean you’re good enough yet to work for the Geographic. Koko seems to have a better handle on composition than a lot of people!

[ASME Unveils Top 40 Magazine Covers - scroll to the bottom of this page to see the Koko cover]

Samsung Hides Phone Software

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t809 thin samsung pc studio logo

Since I got a new computer I’ve slowly been adding the software to make it feel like my own. Tonight I decided to add the cell phone software that came with my phone. That’s where the headaches began.

At the Samsung website the software I needed called Samsung PC Studio is not available. Uh, why not? I called Samsung right away and a helpful guy in a room with lots of noise directed me to find it at a completely different part of the web site.

Note to companies about your software: put the software where people will be looking for it.

This is where it should have been at the download center for SGH-T809. Instead it was available through the Samsung Global Download Center… a site never referenced at the phone’s support web page.

By the way, the great thing about cell phone software is that it lets you do things like manage text messages, backup the address book and upload music from the computer instead of the tiny cell phone screen. Let me know in the comments if you have any tips for making this process work really easily.