Way back in 1960, Pete Seeger wrote a war protest song. It comes to my mind now with the title slightly modified: "Where Have All The Ezines Gone?" Now that I've reinstated this free Neat Net Tricks edition, many have written asking why, since it certainly seems that all the other free newsletters are on their way out the door, or have merged with several others or gone to a paid-subscription format. Maybe I march to a different drummer or felt there was a need to restore a little enjoyment to our computers. Many of the remaining ezines are little more than vehicles to convey ads and affiliate links and I can't fault them for this since I know too well that mail servers cost money. Perhaps indeed the days of the widely-read newsletters are past, and time will tell with this effort. If you find NNT a pleasurable read, then pass it on and urge others to subscribe. The subscriber numbers (or lack thereof) will get the message to me. By the way, speaking of numbers, this really IS Issue 193 of the free edition, although only the second since the relaunch. Enjoy! 01. In this issue, let's talk email. After all, almost all of us use the Internet for that means of communication, and in fact, many use the Internet for no other purpose than to send and receive email in some form or another. A common denominator is spam. We all experience it in our mailboxes in varying extents and, if it bothers you, SPAMGOURMET at http://www.spamgourmet.com/ can help by providing free disposable email addresses and a spam blocker, with two modes: No Brainer mode and Advanced mode. (I won't ask which one you opt for.) CORLIVE.COM is an alternative to e-mail. Only humans can send messages, so there is no spam (since that stuff relies on high-speed bots to spread). Also, there are no anti-spam filters, because they are not necessary. This free service is at http://corlive.com/help/ . Many folks, particularly those on the road away from their home computers, turn to Web mail instead of their traditional POP3 or IMAP accounts. GLOBAL MAIL EXCHANGE at http://mail-us.gmx.com/ offers free Web mail, spam and virus protection, and 5 GB email storage space. GMX also gives you a free email address and forwarding of up to 10 other email addresses to your Web mail account. Instead of resorting to email for your casual exchanges, use PRIVNOTE. Post a note at https://privnote.com/ , send the link to the person you want to read it, and as soon as your message is read it will selfdestruct. Self-destructing is good, especially if you plan on entering the public arena and fear that what you have written will come back to haunt you years from now. And, if you use Gmail and can't attach files, consider gATTACH. A free download at http://chris.wood.name/gAttach/, gAttach allows you to easily attach files to new messages in Gmail or Google Apps Mail. Its sister product, yATTACH, allows the same thing for Yahoo! Mail at http://chris.wood.name/yAttach/ . Whatever email program you use, chances are you'll need the message you just deleted five minutes earlier. MAILSTORE HOME enables you to backup
all your email messages from multiple applications and accounts into one secure and persistent archive. It promises lightning-fast search, oneclick backup and powerful export. Download free at http://www.mailstore.com/en/mailstore-home.aspx . Finally, POP PEEPER is an email notifier that runs in your Windows task bar and alerts you when you have new email on your POP3, IMAP (with IDLE support), Hotmail\MSN\LiveMail, Yahoo, GMail, Mail.com, MyWay, Excite, Lycos.com, RediffMail, Juno and NetZero accounts. IMAP support allows you to access AOL, AIM, Netscape and other services. Send mail directly from POP Peeper and use the address book to email your frequently used contacts. POP Peeper allows you to view messages using HTML or you can choose to safely view all messages in rich or plain text. Several options are available that will decrease or eliminate the risks of reading your email (viruses, javascript, webbugs, etc). POP Peeper can be run from a portable device and can be password protected. Many notification options are availble to indicate when new mail has arrived, such as sound alerts (configurable for each account), flashing scroll lock, skinnable popup notifier, customized screensaver and more. Download at http://www.poppeeper.com/ . * * * * Want more Neat Net Tricks? Get 24 issues winging their way to you over the next year for just $12 US. It contains features you won't see in this free edition. A free sample is at www.neatnettricks.com/NNTSample.htm. Subscribe at http://www.NeatNetTricks.com/store and if you don't think it's worth the money, there's a no-questions-asked full refund guarantee. * * * * 02. Now that you have your email functioning more efficiently, its time for a break. It's the dead of summer in much of our world and with it those pesky flies return to mar our picnic. FLY SWATTER at http://majman.net/fly_loader.html is is one of those diversions you'll likely visit and then soon forget. But at least when you leave the site you won't have to clean up all those dead flies. 03. SHOOT-EM-UPS. The NLOS CANNON CHALLENGE is an interesting little time waster with good graphics and sounds. Set the elevation and velocity correctly to knock out targets at http://dsc.discovery.com/tv/futureweapons/games/cannon/cannon.html . OK, I know it's not videogame quality but it IS free after all. And if you can stand one more shoot-em-up try MUTUALLY ASSURED DESTRUCTION (MAD) at http://www.addictinggames.com/mad.html . 04. OK, back to work to improve your computer's performance. AUSLOGICS REGISTRY DEFRAG will defrag and compact the Windows Registry in less than one minute. It will scan through the Registry to remove slack spaces, reducing the Registry size and ultimately the amount of RAM the Registry takes up. Download free at http://www.auslogics.com/en/software/registrydefrag/overview .
05. QUIKMAPS at http://www.quikmaps.com/ provides the mapping we've all become accustomed to, with the added feature that you can mark the path with an array of markers, labels, and doodles to help illustrate your route. 06. TEXT SNIP. Enter your text at http://textsnip.com/ and you get a URL pointing to that text and it keeps all your formatting intact. Share the URL with anyone you wish. 07. STATE OF THE AIR. The American Lung Association asks "What's The State of Your Air?" Click on your state at http://www.stateoftheair.org/ and find out. You may want to pack your bags and head for higher ground. 08. HOTT NOTES. Take out the trash. Feed the cat. Walk the dog. I don't know about you, but sometimes my memory is about a half-sandwich short of a picnic. Those little paper post-it notes are too expensive. Well, Hott Notes let you post sticky note reminders and checklists on your desktop, draw on them, archive them, even set alarms. You can forget about all that stuff you tape to your refrigerator and download this free little program at http://hottnotes.com . 09. WRAPPING UP. If you've forgotten how to manage your free NNT subscription (change of address, setting vacation mode, etc.) just send email to neatnettricks-request@freelists.org and state simply "info" without the quotation marks in the subject line of your email. If you have a problem or just want to comment about NNT, reach me at jteems@neatnettricks.com . And most importantly, please help this issue grow in numbers by encouraging all your acquaintances to subscribe. All it takes is a click at http://www.neatnettricks.com/subscribe .