Google Maps

   Today I'll be talking about Google Maps and a competitor to it.  Now one thing about Google Maps is that its a digital map that you would somewhat use like a normal map, but everything is digital and more colorful.  Now Google Maps unlike Google Earth seems to have my  actual 911 address/physical address right.  Also Google Maps is very simplistic to use its pretty much you type in where you're at and where you want to go and Google Maps does it for you.  You can select which method of travel and It'll give you a rough estimate of how many mile it is and how long it'll take to your destination.  you can have up to eight points on your travel route, but you can make more by making a new layer.

Google maps in action

Bing Maps

  Now what better competitor than Microsoft's Bing Maps.  Bing Maps is good in its own respects and most aspects of Google Maps.  One thing I've noticed while using it is that unlike GM it doesn't automatically spell out your searches for you as your typing below so you can speed up time.  The most part is that Bing Maps is not much different to Google Maps then what I can see.

Bing Maps in action

    So i've went over Google Maps and Bing Maps and compared and talked about the two.  So thanks for reading and have a nice day.

How Social Media Sites have Changed Us

MySpace logo

Faxebook logo

    Social Media sites in general have changed the way we do things today.  We now stay in touch with our relative and friends through media such as Facebook, MySpace, Google+, and other forms. It also lets us talk to multiple friends at once from many different areas unlike how we could only do one through phone or would have to drive far and meet up to suit everyone's needs. Now everyone can be happy with the current way of social media.  Another thing that Social media introduced  games that everyone can now play and help out their friends and family by gifting items to help each other out.  One few more bad things about social media is the drama that follows with it and scams that can happen.  Also its not healthy for people themselves to stay cooped up in their homes at their computers desks and also it can have them neglect their other duties in the process.

Google+

     So as you can see that's how social media can be bad and good. So here's my little blog on Social Media sites and how they have changed us.

Social Media Sites

            Today I'll be going over some Social Media sites that are free and that you may want to check out and use.

Google+

  Google+ is like Google's answer to MySpace, Facebook, and Skype, but does things differently.  Now the Google+ layout is quite simple in ways of how it looks and operates.

Google+ layout

         Google+ also allows you to keep your friends, family, and etc. organized up top.  Now as you can see by the picture it's layout is very similar to Facebook's, but very much more simpler to understand at first glance and doesn't always keep changing every five days.  another neat thing is that Google+ has a cool little neat thing called hangouts.  The best way for me to describe hangouts is that it's very much like Skype and if you don't know Skype then its like this.  What Google hangouts does is that you can get a bunch of friends across computer, hone, or whatever that can in a Google hangout session, where you can talk to your friends via video or audio.

MySpace

   Now MySpace is the odd one out of the whole bunch because of the way its setup.

Myspace page layout

     Now in my opinion I think Myspace is just a very bad site when its trying to be like Facebook, but I think MySpace can be a little more better if they improve on one thing and remove another.  What I think is that if they just get rid of the whole posting on your wall thing and just focus on their music selection, bands could then use Myspace as a way to communicate with their fans as of ways to promote album releases and tours.  Now Myspace is the oldest of most well-known social sites but its no excuse for the way it looks and works for its just so poorly and strong together its ugly in my opinion.

Facebook

    Facebook is probably the king of social media sites in my opinion because its been refined to the point of almost perfection in the way its setup,  though that doesn't mean it has no bad things going for it.  Now one the thing about  Facebook is that its always updating and changing everything. 

facebook page layout

       Now as you can see Facebook's layout is simple and very much easy to use.  Now the only thing about Facebook I don't really like is Zynga,  Because of their business practice.

   So that's my three reviews on three different social media sites.

Free music sites that you can listen to music with..............becuase youtube is too inferior?

The different music providers on the internet were very fun to explore. Some websites were very good and some just really wasn't all to great in my opinion.

Pandora: Has a good music base and is still updating its music library with newer bands that i like. Pandora has a very good selection of  major and minor bands.

Groove Shark: Groove shark is neat cuaes when you type in the band it pulls up a page of them and their albums and songs. Also it allows you to make your own playlist unlike how Pandora generates one for you. They seem to have some things Pandora has and vice-versa. Its database is still growing like Pandora's and is as expansive.

Slacker:  Slacker is a very unique station in general were you can create your own radio stations and view others stations. Its music database is quite expansive like Pandora's and Grooveshark's and it has a good size of bands on it that I liked.

   Out of all the different stations they all have their pros and cons and, different styles.  Also they all have paid services and ads that make you take time out of your music listening to listen to but, help keep the sites free from having to pay.  I'll rather make or find playlist using youtube, but that's just my preference

10 random IT/nerd/geek related costumes

       These are just ten random IT and nerd/geek related costumes that are in no particular order.  So enjoy all the random pictures.

doctor who

A computer

(Firefox)

warhammer

cellphone

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robot

star wars

robo-cop

Another Computer costime since this is more IT geared

evil dead III(ash Williams)

And so there you have it ten random IT related costumes.

TOR project

       Today i'm going to talk about the Tor project and what it is.  The tor project is a free software that allows for online anonymity.  What Tor does is that it makes network tracking difficult.  The data and its destination are encrypted and re-encrypted multiple times and then sent through a random path randomly by one of the TOR relays. 

Tor homepage

  Tor stands for the "The Onion Routing".  Tor's purpose is to hide their user's ID and network activity from tracking.  TOR software runs a onion proxy on their user's computers that periodically negotiates a vital circuit through the TOR networks.  

That's my little thing on how the TOR project works, if you want to know more then just go to torproject.org or google it for more info.

       

RSS Sites

     Today i'm going over two RSS news reader sites that may interest some people.  These sites are free to use and are very simple to use.  Now for those that don't know what a RSS news reader site is, its a thing that lets you check to see if a site has updated anything recently by showing a small tid-bit paragraph from each site.

Feedly 

    Feedly is one of those news reader site.  Feedly lets you see you sites that you normally visit but without having to go to every site individually, but instead has all your sites in a list and shows small exempts from each site whenever new content goes up.  Feedly would probably be better if you use it on your phone or tablets and really I just favorite all my site so its easy finding for everything.

News360

   News360 is another RSS site reader and it too bad at it.  News360 lets you pick from a list of sites taht they have listed for you to pick, or you can pick a category which comes with a wide range of sites.  Also News360 lets you favorite articles and that you may have liked or want to finish reading.  The only complaint I could find was that I couldn't pick a site that I wanted personally but instead a list of sites it gives me,but it is a news reader and it does show news quite well. Besides that I find it more flashier than Feedly and do like its layout somewhat better.

 

So there's two free RSS site that you can use at will (might use them to find new sites to read) ,but like I said favoring site with your browser is better in my opinion. Well that's all and thanks for reading, you poor souls.