Tech Speak
Favicon
Short for favorite icon, a customized icon that is used by Microsoft Internet Explorer (IE) versions 5.0 and later. When a user bookmarks a specific Web page, that Web page loads a customized icon into the user’s browser, typically a tiny version of a company or Web site’s logo. The favicon is displayed next to the Web site’s name in the Favorites list and can also be displayed in the Links toolbar. When a site has not created a favicon, IE will load the IE logo into the browser by default.
Gizmo
Oboe Locker
Price: $39.95 a year
Having your entire music collection at your fingertips is simple enough if you own an iPod or other portable digital player with multiple gigabytes of storage. Until you drop it. Or the PC that you use to synch your player has a meltdown. Then what? One option is turning to MP3tunes’ Oboe Locker, a Web-based service launched by the founder of the original MP3.com. Oboe provides an affordable way to protect against a catastrophic loss of music files by serving as an unlimited online storage backup. It also has an added perk: Users can listen to their own music on virtually any computer.
Tech Q&A
Q: I understand both Canon and Toshiba showed SED televisions at the Consumer Electronics Show this year. What are these? Are they better than plasma and LCDs?
A: SED stands for Surface-conduction Electron-emitter Display. It uses more than 6 million electron emitters to light up pixels on the screen. (Plasma fluoresces gases to light pixels; LCDs use transistors to regulate light reaching the pixels.) SED TVs have much higher contrast ratios, and show deep blacks. Supposedly, their pictures are significantly better than those shown on plasmas and LCDs.
Hot Sites
At the Coudal Partners Museum of Online Museums, you will find links to online collections and exhibits covering a vast array of interests from the ordinary to the bizarre, like the Cereal Character Premium Museum.
www.coudal.com/ archive.php?cat=cat=moom
What if you display all of your favorite Internet information — Web sites, RSS feeds, Flickr photos, Flash games, etc. — in a single desktop-style browser window? Now you can using Firefox, and this free service.
You’ll need to have a fast connection to download these gargantuan images; take for instance an image of Earth seen from space that is 86,000 pixels wide by 43,000 pixels deep for 10.7 gigabytes.
http://iipimage.source forge.net/demo.shtml
Looking for free e-mail? This site lets you search its database of free e-mail providers spanning 85 countries.