Create Your Own Ringtones For Free

Are you tired of navigating through websites, with loads of fine prints, looking for ringtones for your mobile phone and paying major music labels for copyrighted songs? Or being saddled with a phone bill that burns a hole in your pocket for that supposedly free ringtone you have downloaded because you failed to read the fine print?

Well, here are two recently launched web services that allows you to create your very own ringtones for free without needing any downloading of ringtone-making software or surprise users with hidden fees:

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1. Cellware
Positioning itself as a mobile social networking site, Cellware has one of the largest selection of content for your phone on the Web and allows users to upload and create their own ringtones for free. Simple Flash tools allows the uploading of entire MP3 sound tracks, edit them into 20 seconds clips and send them to users cellphones as ringtones. It also allows users to mix several tracks together into a mashup and being a networking site, tag and share them with friends and community members. All brands of mobile phone, except Apple iPhone, work with Cellware. And the kicker - you can even earn money when you share the stuff you have uploaded !

2. Tonebee
Similar to Cellware, Tonebee is another recently launched web service that allows users to create their own personalized cell phone ringtone for free by simply uploading their favorite Mp3 songs onto the “Mp3 ToneBee Ringtone Maker." In just 3 simple steps - uploading, selecting the portion of the song (30 seconds or less) you want and saving it on your PC - users will have the desired ringtone for their cellphones. The stored song can be transferred onto any cell phone as long as the phone has Mp3 capabilities. Beside creating ringtones, Tonebee also has videos, photos and news from around the world related to almost any artist, band, album or song you can think of.

*Related posts :
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- WhatZatSong & other free online quirky tools

Tech News - Goggle Challenges Wikipedia With "Knol"

Here is this week's round-up of tech news and what's hot in the Web :

1. Google Challenges Wikipedia With "Knol"
Google has announced that it will be launching a new Internet encyclopedia, a concept called "knol"- a shorthand for a "unit of knowledge"- that will see it competing with the highly popular user-supported Wikipedia.

The Googlepedia, as some netizens are calling it, will consist of material submitted by users but unlike Wikipedia, there will be no cloak of anonymity and all submissions will be identified. There will be no editing of entries by Google but instead, visitors will rate and comment on them. For now, submissions are by invitation only but will eventually be open to all comers. The resource is free to use and Google will monetize it by placing contextual ads related to the topics covered on each page.

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With more than 56 million US visitors eye-balling Wikipedia in Oct alone, making it the eighth most popular website, the concept will definitely pose a challenge to non-profit Wikipedia which has emerged as a widely used reference tool. While lifting the cloak of anonymity to submissions is a step in the right direction, unless it has its own editorial team to vet the entries, Google's "knol", in allowing visitors to rate and comment the submissions, will open it to the same sort of uneven content and the many abuses that Wikipedia has.

2. Flickr Launches "Places"
Flickr, Yahoo's online photo-sharing site, will soon unveil a service called "Places" that identifies on a global map, the latest hot spots for photo contributions and allows users to browse photos from millions of geographically located photos uploaded onto its site. With many of the world's cities, states and countries having their own featured pages, "Places" also allows users to search by geographic location for photos that might interest them.

With more than 40 million monthly visitors to Flickr, the feature will be especially appealing to prospective travellers seeking to go beyond photos of landmarks for places they plan to visit. "Places" will be available in the eight languages that Flickr currently offers - English, Spanish, German, French, Portuguese, Italian, Korean and traditional Chinese.

3. ScanR Revolutionises Scanning, Copying And Faxing Industry
Convert an image of a document, business card or a whiteboard message, captured on your camera phone or digital camera, to a PDF file or vCard format and get it emailed or faxed to you through ScanR, a new US-based startup.

The free-to-use web service is set to revolutionise the scanner, copier and fax industry with its technology that identifies keywords during the conversion process and assigns them as tags that make the file searchable on ScanR or any desktop search software. ScanR also works with any mobile phone.

4. Ultra-Mobile PC - Asus Launches Eee PC
While ultra-mobile laptops, which weighs below 1kg and have screen sizes of 7 inches and below, have been around for about a year, the price tags of the initial releases were quite exorbitant, considering their limited capabilities, costing over US$1,300 each. Not anymore.

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Asus has just launched the Eee PC, an ultra-mobile laptop that hit the sweet spot with its low price of around US$400. Designed for affordability, it comes with a Intel Mobile Celeron ultra-low voltage 900 MHz processor, 512 MB RAM, 3 USB ports, LAN port, built-in webcam, SD card slot, 800 x 480 seven-inch display, stereo speakers, Wi-Fi and an impressive 5200 mAh battery which supports 3.5 hours of use.

There is no hard disk drive but has instead, 4GB of solid-state flash memory and while using flash memory means that you get less storage, you get better power efficiency, faster boot times and less heat instead. The launch was so successful that over 300 pieces were snapped up within a day or two at the Sitex show in Singapore recently.

The Asus Eee PC, which stands for easy-to-work, easy-to-play and easy-to-learn, uses Linux instead of Windows and the user interface is extremely well-designed and divided into Work, Play and Learn tabs for easy access to applications. The icons are large and at 920g, decked out in a crisp pearl white body, is aptly suited for students and professionals on a budget, and is likely to be a benchmark for all other ultra-mobile PCs to follow.

*More Tech News :
- Google Opens Up Orkut
- Members Blast Facebook

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7 Free And Boss-Pleasing Things You Can Do With Facebook.

Bosses hate Facebook as they consider it a robber of productivity and worker hours. A recent study of 3,500 companies by UK employment law firm Peninsula found that an estimated 233 million hours were lost every month as a result of employees "wasting time" on networking sites such as Facebook. Many companies and even governments have already banned the site, for example the Ontario government in Canada.

However, with the right applications and used correctly, Facebook can actually help improve productivity at work. Here are seven free and boss-pleasing things you can do with Facebook :

1. Sell Your Company's Goods Online
Great for small companies who want to move their products online, the Marketplace section is where all Facebook users post items they want to buy or sell. Unlike eBay, listings are free but the listing will be available only to others in the same network in Facebook as you. But by paying US$1, you can publicise your listing to other Facebook users, in the form of online advertisements on their Facebook pages. (marketplace.jpg)

2. Raise Capital For Business
If you are residing in the United States, raise capital by joining the Lending Club, a community where you can borrow and lend money to fellow Facebook members. Members lend and borrow money directly to and from each other online, bypassing the banks and enjoying better rates. All members' identities and bank accounts are verified and borrowers credit-checked by the Lending Club. Lenders are also provided with a borrower's credit history and only borrowers with credit scores of above 640 are accepted. To-date, the Club has already passed US$3.7 million in loans to Facebook users. Great alternative fund raising avenue for companies intending to set up office in the US. (lendingclub.jpg)

3. Track The Stock Market
If your job or company dabble in stocks and shares, get real and updated stock quotes with the Simple Stock Quotes application which is updated every 15 minutes. (stock.jpg)

4. Read the Latest News
Get the latest news relevant to your business with the Simply feed application which allows you to read the latest happenings in your industry on Facebook. You can also share your feeds and shared items in Google Reader with friends. (rss.jpg)

5. Store And Share Office Documents
If you use the online office suite Zoho to create and edit office documents and spreadsheets, you can upload and share them with colleagues on Facebook using Zoho Facebook. (zoho.jpg)

6. Send And Get e-mail
Facebook's e-mail application lets you send and receive e-mail within the networking site. Choose your own e-mail address, and if the recipient replies through the web-form provided in the link in the e-mail, his reply will be displayed as a thread. (e-mail.jpg)

7. Make a Statement
With the Groups function, rally the troops to stand behind your boss vision and business direction or make a statement to meet your company's key targets for the year.

*Related post : WatZatSong And Other Free Online Quirky Tools

WordTracker - For The Best Keywords

WatZatSong And Other Free Online Quirky Tools

Once in a while we come across certain unique situations where we wish there were software or web tools to help us with these quirky stuff. Well, here are some free web tools that are not common but will certainly come in handy for those rare occasions :

WatZatSong
You have just heard a great tune on the radio but the DJ does not identify it and goes on to play other hits. The tune gets stuck in your head, refuses to go away and you end up a bit looney, humming it to friend after friend, hoping to find someone someone who is able to identify it for you.

Well, can the humming with WatZatSong, where you can easily get the answer to that lovely but nameless jingle. Just give as much information as you can about the song, like male or female singer or a group and genre, and record a short sample of it online - yup, sing a little of the jingle into your mike and the site will automatically record and upload it. Then, just wait for the community to ping you for an answer to your nameless jingle. And don't worry about being tone-deaf as it is an anonymous recording.

Drop.io
Anyone working can easily identify with the disconnect between the e-mail quota we want and the amount company IT administrators think we should have, which is usually much smaller. So, what do you do if you need to send and receive large files?

Share them online with Drop.io and you'll have the gratitude of people whose inboxes won't be clog up and save yourself the hassle of having to break up large mail attachments too. As the name suggests, just drop your files online, tell your friends where to look and share them. No account sign-up is needed and there is a 100 MB upload limit for each file but you can use the service as often as you like. With no irritating pop-ups and ads, a clean and easy-to-use interface, Drop.io promises that all files uploaded stay online forever and can be downloaded as many times as you need them to be.

OnlineConversion
Tired of having your system bog down for hours while you are downloading a file that was supposed to take only minutes? Check your download time before you hit the download button at OnlineConversion Download Time Calculator. Just enter the size of the file you want to download and the calculator will quickly estimate the amount of time the download needs based on its size and the speed of your Net connection ( DSL, 56kbps modem, etc).

ReadPlease
Eyes glazed and tired from all the proof reading of your articles? Let your computer talk to you and do all the proof reading with ReadPlease, an easy-to-use and excellent text-to-speech software. ReadPlease never gets tire and reads exactly what's in the text, no more and no less. Hearing the text spoken out loud allows you to find subtle errors that you might overlook like bad phrasing, missing words, doubled words and poor punctuation. An excellent tool for writers and a godsend for people with vision or reading problems.

Portable Apps
Put your entire computer in your pocket and be productive while on the go with PortableApps, an open-source software that allows you to store your favourite applications and settings, including passwords and bookmarks, in any storage device like your iPod or thumb drive. Your PC productivity tools, web browsers, video player and games are just as welcome with PortableApps. Just plug in your thumb drive at any public PC at the airport or a cybercafe and you can access all your favourite applications without leaving any trace of your personal data behind.

WebWasher
Get rid of bandwidth-hogging online ads and surf faster with WebWasher, a 1.2 MB utility that eliminates pop-ups, banners and jumbo-sized ads that increase the time it takes to view Web pages. This nifty tool also crushes cookies and prevents companies from profiling your surfing habits and protects you from bugs and invisible graphics hidden in documents that trigger the sending of messages to third parties.

*Related post : Free Specialised Software For Your Desktop