Web Worker Daily

It’s WebWorkerDaily’s fault that I’ve bought an iPod touch (s aapl). (That’s my excuse, anyway.) As I looked at potential subjects to write about, I kept seeing cool apps, and I need to be able to test them, right?

But why not buy an iPhone, or a Palm Pre, which I’d had my eye on for several months? The Pre seems to be a good phone, but it doesn’t yet have the apps that the iPhone does. And the monthly fees for Pre service are considerably higher than what I’m paying now. The iPhone’s monthly fees are even higher, and many folks I’ve talked to don’t find it to be a very good phone.

So, keeping my current phone and buying an iPod touch seemed like a good compromise. I can get good Wi-Fi coverage in most areas where I live, so I’ll be able to go online, even without the phone function.

Many of my WWD colleagues already have iPhones. Aliza has recently written about good apps for web workers. Dawn’s shared her favorites, too. But with the holidays coming up, here are some of my ideas for apps to put on that brand-new iPhone or iPod touch: Read the rest of this entry »

I’ve been using Google Voice since it was GrandCentral, and have been quite impressed. But it’s still in beta, and while invitations to the beta are finally becoming available, I understand that they’re still hard to come by.

3jam is billing itself as an alternative to Google Voice, and it’s available today, so I’ve given it a quick spin. This is not a complete review, as there are some of 3jam’s features that I haven’t tried, such as SMS messaging, forwarding to Skype, an API that lets you write your own applications to interact with their service, and “group” numbers that allow multiple users to share voice mail and messaging. Read the rest of this entry »

Use Skype IM within Pidgin

For those of us who use instant messaging to conduct our day-to-day business, we know the frustrations of having multiple friends spread throughout all the major IM platforms including Google Talk, AIM, Yahoo!, MSN, and Skype. Pidgin is a freeware multi-protocol IM product that allows access to all your contacts from Yahoo!, MSN, Google Talk, and many more systems. However, Skype however was always closed off.

Not any longer, thanks to the Skype API and the Skype API Plugin for Pidgin. Using this free plugin, you can instant message back and forth with your Skype contacts within Pidgin. At this point, it isn’t possible to do voice calling from Pidgin. However every Skype contact is brought into Pidgin for easy access. Because Pidgin is cross-platform, this functionality is available for Windows, Mac, and Linux.