On Computers

After printing out eight placemats for my sister’s birthday, I laminated them with the Scotch “Thermal Laminator,” $31 at Target. The placemats include photos of my six-month-old niece, a “Happy Birthday” greeting and a cartoonish cake. I know my sister will like them because she’s still using the holiday placemats I made years ago. To start, I used “Hallmark Card Studio,” $31 on Amazon, which can be downloaded to multiple machines. After finishing a variety of designs– which was as easy as choosing images and text to plop onto paper– I turned to YouTube for a demo of the laminator. I’m all thumbs when it comes to hardware. Here’s how it works: To start, choose one of two settings, depending […]

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Filed under: AI, art, cheap calls, Internuts, kids, video | Comments Off on MAKE YOUR OWN PHOTO PLACEMATS AND LAMINATE THEM

The free Yuka app uncovers the dangerous ingredients lurking in foods and cosmetics. I wish it said “yuck” every time it gave a bad rating. Thanks to Yuka, I decided not to buy Mission’s “Carb Balance Whole Wheat Tortillas” ever again. Yuka gave it a dreadful score, with all the reasons outlined. It also suggested healthy alternatives, but best of all, it saves your searches and the ratings, with photos of the scanned products and their alternatives, along with other great info. To start, download and install the free app from the app store, then open it and tap its scan icon. Then scan a barcode. That’s how I found out that Olay’s “Complete Daily Moisturizer,” with sunscreen, which I’ve […]

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Filed under: apps, games, podcasts, robots, troubleshooting, video | Comments Off on FREE APP FINDS RISKY INGREDIENTS IN FOOD, COSMETICS

Ever wonder how 79,032 music critics would rank your tastes? Do a Google search on “Pudding Cool: How Bad is Your Streaming Music?” After you sign into your Apple or Spotify account, an artificially intelligent robot will look over everything you’ve been listening to, ask you questions and combine the opinions of experts. “Do you really listen to The Girl from Ipanema by Stan Getz?” it asked me. When I said yes, it said, “Like, ironically?” When I said “no,” it said “cool.” It teased me about my other choices and asked whether I’d rather marry the Tijuana Brass, Glenn Miller or Fred Astaire. Yet my score was 79 out of 100, compared to 21 out of 100 for a […]

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Filed under: apps, Gmail, Internet, music, video, YouTube | Comments Off on AI ANALYZES YOUR TASTE IN MUSIC

A friend just gave me a delightful Christmas present. It’s the Jacquie Lawson Edwardian Advent Calendar, an $8 download from JacquieLawson.com. Besides something special on each day, it has other activities. In a beautiful living room with colorfully wrapped presents, for example, I found an undecorated Christmas tree. I clicked it to choose lights, ornaments and more. Then I clicked the presents to reveal games. One led me to fascinating versions of Solitaire, including one with cards of the same suit and color. I then solved a puzzle that turned into a beautiful painting, and clicked a music book to reveal the wondrous tunes I was listening to. When the program first opens, click the star on the outside of […]

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Filed under: AI, art, gadgets, games, how-to, Internuts, kids, shopping, video | Comments Off on DIGITAL ADVENT CALENDAR

My sister says her co-workers spend their whole lunch hour scrolling on their phones. Kids also do that from what I’ve heard. A smart watch could be the answer. A Lyft driver told me he bought T-Mobile’s SyncUp Kids Watch for his 10-year-old daughter on their $10-a-month plan so she won’t become a tech zombie. She can call, text and play a few games, but is not on social media. Plus, he gets real-time location tracking and text alerts if she ventures beyond his limits. The watch costs $174, but is free for those who sign up for the service. It comes in pink or blue or you can add your own watchband. But that’s just one of many smart […]

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Filed under: AI, video, word processing | Comments Off on SMART WATCHES TACKLE PHONE ADDICTION

Artificially-intelligent bots are plagiarizing known authors. It happened to author Jane Friedman, who reports on the publishing industry. A copycat version of her work was reviewed on Goodreads. Friedman told ZDnet that an author she found on Twitter.com has been plagiarized by AI bots 29 times. It could be a growing problem. Suppose, for example, that you insert the text of a published novel into a site like ChatGPT, and ask for it to be rewritten in the bot’s own words. Next you run the result through an AI content detector. If it scores 100 percent, it’s 100 percent fakey-sounding. So you tweak it a bit before uploading to Kindle Direct Publishing. I decided to test this idea myself. I […]

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Filed under: AI, environment, games, Google, health, Internuts, kids, security, text messaging, video, word processing | Comments Off on PLAGIARISM BY CHATBOTS

I left my phone in a Lyft on the way to the airport. But Google Voice, the free phone service, saved me. Using the airport’s free WiFi on my laptop, I went to Voice.Google.com and typed in my friend’s phone number, to say that I’d arrived. Alternatively, I could have used the Google Voice app, though on a Windows machine you need to go to the website instead. Either way, the call quality is excellent. The great thing is, Google Voice lets you call anyone. With apps like Facebook Messenger, your recipients must use the same service. For the next six days, I was happily phoneless. But I still wanted to find the darn thing. So I Googled “Find My […]

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Filed under: Amazon, apps, books, cheap calls, crytpocurrency, Google, how-to, Internuts, security, training, video | Comments Off on GOOGLE VOICE SAVES THE DAY

Duolingo, the language app, is now boosted by CHATGPT-4. Thanks to artificial intelligence, it’s rolling out “Role Play.”  Role Play drops you into an imaginary scenario in French or Spanish. For example, suppose you’re bantering with a waitress in Barcelona while munching tapas. After your conversation, a robot will tell you how you did. It’s part of the new “Duolingo Max” subscription for iPhone only, which is slowly rolling out across America. In an article in a recent New Yorker magazine, the writer describes her mock session in a French cafe. After some exchanges, she said “I love you,” to the AI machine. When it asked if she would rather spend evenings alone, she said she would if everyone was […]

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Filed under: Amazon, batteries, education, facebook, health, Internuts, video | Comments Off on ROLE PLAYING WITH AI

Netflix is trying to crack down on the 100 million customers worldwide who get free movies by signing in with a friend’s username and password. But a new service called Gowd lets you buy your Netflix sign-in credentials from strangers. Gowd is like eBay for TV. Sellers choose their own prices, starting at 50 cents a month. When I looked, Apple TV Plus was 50 cents but there was a waitlist. A Disney/Hulu/ESPN bundle was $5, Netflix was $5, and Amazon Prime was $2. The site has every service you’ve ever heard of and then some. To start, register at Gowd.com and put a dollar or two into you account. I signed up for PeacockTV for $1, and enjoyed the […]

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Filed under: apps, cameras, photos, troubleshooting, video | Comments Off on GOWD COMPETES WITH NETFLIX

Compared to last year, the number of people using Google to find out how to make money on YouTube has tripled, according to Google Trends. Some have made major moola. A little boy named Ryan earned $27 million for his YouTube channel “Ryan’s World,” where he unboxes the latest toys. But YouTube’s top channel, according to Variety.com, is “MrBeast.” It’s earned over $54 million so far.  A recent MrBeast video is about a guy who was offered $10,000 a day to stay in a specially-rigged apartment/prison, with fantastic gourmet meals delivered daily. Though he occasionally experiences loud noises, flashing lights and other distractions, he mostly copes with the confinement. But each day he has to give up one item in […]

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Filed under: Amazon, apps, Internuts, video | Comments Off on MAKING MONEY ON YOUTUBE