Happy Holidays!!

I’m totally cheating this week with the Byte. I wrote a fun article for the Blandin Foundation this month so I thought I’d share it. I’ll give you the first 4 cool tools here – but you’ll have to go to the Blandin site to see the rest:
http://tinyurl.com/c9ded5

1. Twitter (http://www.twitter.com) – a real time, text-based chat service. Members can read and send message through the web, cell phone or other handheld device. It’s not new, but it is reaching more and more people every day.

2. Midomi (http://www.midomi.com/) – a musical search engine where you can sing or hum a song to perform a search. Hum a tune and it will get more information for you.

3. Layar (http://layar.com/) – a cell phone application that shows real time geographic digital information through the camera of your mobile phone. Use it when you visit a new town; point your phone’s camera down a street and laid over a digital map will be information such as street names, building names, names and details of local businesses and even reviews from sites such as Yelp (http://www.yelp.com), when available.

4. Square (https://squareup.com/) – a gadget that allows you to accept credit card payments through any device with an audio input jack. It’s a great soon to small businesses; imagine the artist at a craft fair now able to accept payments quickly, easily and cost effectively.

I’m hoping to check out some of the tools in greater detail in the next few months. I’ll let you know how it goes.

Thanks and have a great holiday!