Posted by thetechmanual on May 29, 2008
Rules of thumb
Treat All contests as fake. Treat all emails that promise free things as scams. Delete or report as Spam to block future correspondence.
Email
Email is the de facto standard to communicate in the Internet. Email is the equivalent of a fax machine. It is a very convenient way to send documents without needing the receiving party to be by the phone. They can read the document or message at their leisure in full clear color at virtually no cost.
Power of Three
If you are new to the Internet setup 3 email addresses. If you already
have an email you need to have at least 2 web based email i.e.: Yahoo
or Gmail
1. One email for personal contacts. People you know in real life. This should be your name preferably your full name if you have to, add a memorable number behind it. Sample JohnSmith911@gmail.com
2. Second email is for website registrations. Free website registrations are common and are usually very useful sites. Sometimes though they might build mailing list for Spam or advertisement which you don’t want getting mixed with your personal correspondents. Sample JohnEmail@gmail.com
3. Third email address is for beginners and use this if you don’t know that company your singing up with at all, but you want to get some quick info from them such as they require an email address to check out one page. You’ll probably never go back to the site, but you are curious. Also for experimental memberships, so you can check out a site and if you like it then you can change your email address with them to your secondary email address which you do check often. Sample JohnSurvey@gmail.com
The reason that I recommend web based email is two-fold. You can access it from more places than having to be tied to your computer at home. Most phones let you access web based email. The second reason is simply because in the future you might move and switch internet providers. Having email setup away from your internet provider means you can move and switch and still your email address stays unchanged.
In conclusion, never enter any of the emails you’ve setup unless you were already planning to do so. Never email passwords or sensitive information to anyone. Never respond to advertisements, not even to tell them to stop sending you information, just mark them as Spam.
Always be aware that sending an email is very unsecure. It is the equivalent of screaming your message across the net and so expect little privacy.
Posted in Email, Essentials | Tagged: Email | No Comments »
Posted by thetechmanual on May 27, 2008
Web based email is the most convenient email, because you can access it anywhere you have an Internet connection. It is also the easiest to sign up for. Here are the two places I highly recommend for reasons I’ll explain in another section.
Both sign ups are only one page long and easy to complete. Best of all both are totally free!
Yahoo! Email
Gmail from Google
Both offer so much space that you need not ever erase an email, but you can if its unimportant to you.
The most important reason to use web based email is that you can keep your email address for life. If you decide to change internet providers you don’t have to change your email address. If you move out of state you can still use the same email address. Ok, you get the idea.
Posted in Email, Essentials, Quick Tips | Tagged: Email, Email in 5 Minutes | No Comments »
Posted by thetechmanual on May 26, 2008
Here’s a list of things to do some research in, if you are new to the internet.
Google.com - This is the best search engine bar none
Gmail.com - Free webbased email
Yahoo Mail - Free webbased email easy to use for beginners, just make sure you use the classic interface. They have the best tutorial section.
Yahoo! is great for people who are starting out. Explore as much as you can. After you setup your email with them you can use that user name to customize My.Yahoo.com this is a great way to customize your internet sources. You can setup RSS feeds which is a way to get news about subjects you are into. A quick way of doing this is:
- make sure you have signed in to your email then
- go to news.yahoo.com
- locate the Search all news field
- type in a subject you are interested in: NFL Falcons
- find the:
and click on it.
- you’ll get dialog confirming that you want it added to your personal page
This personal page is just like your own personal newspaper. You can add pages and sections. Add a Sports page. A National news page. Even an Entertainment page. Its a great morning paper.
Well explore and enjoy.
Posted in Beginner, Email, Essentials, Tutorial Links, Yahoo! | Tagged: Beginners, Gmail, Google, Yahoo! | No Comments »
Posted by thetechmanual on May 25, 2008
On my quick tips I mention a way to send links to online articles for later viewing and archiving. This strategy is good for the short term. The scrapbook strategy I’m about to discuss takes it a bit farther. It preserves the article for the extreme long term.
Gmail as a scrapbook of the internet.
Ever found a great article on a subject that you want to save complete with pictures. And you want to save it for the long term. You can build your own personal library with Gmail and the Google toolbar.
Yes a toolbar. The Google toolbar has many uses, but to keep it simple we’ll focus on one feature. A powerful feature that sometimes gets lost in the jungle of options. So here it goes.
Optional
If you don’t like the Google Toolbar and want to end up with a clean interface follow the following steps:
The following example of course deals with Firefox, like most of my articles.
- Install the Google Toolbar. Click on View Menu | Toolbars | Customize
- Instead of using the Customize Toolbar dialog, direct your attention to the Google Toolbar and locate the “send to” icon
- Drag this icon to be a part of your links Toolbar.
- Then close the dialog. Click on View Menu | Toolbars and uncheck the Google Toolbar. Now you have a clean system again with the exception of the new send to icon.
Usage
Now when you see anything on any webpage you want to save.
- Highlight and click the icon.
- Select Gmail.
- Put your email address.
- Click send
That is it. Now you have a permanent copy in your massive Gmail account quickly searchable for your convenience.
You can also skip the highlight and simply click on the “send to” icon and send the whole page.
Advanced (optional)
What I do is create a filter which activates any time an email contains aStar or astar. It then archives, labels it as an “a Article” and adds a star to it. Reason for “a” is a strategy I use to sort labels not only alphabetically, but also by attention priority. My top labels have an “a” in front with a space. When I’m done reading the article I take off the star.
Convenience
You can archive more than just the Internet this way. You can email yourself pictures you take on the road business cards and the like. Just tag them as you email them. Not only with the “astar” operator but with key words such as “John Smith Business card.” If you forget to tag, reply to that picture with the key words as body or subject. That will create a conversation which is searchable.
Posted in Gmail, Google | Tagged: Gmail, Google Toolbar, Scrapbook | No Comments »
