News - Part 8

Free App Friday For 8/21/15: Utilities

Free App Friday! The special Free App Friday posts I ran for the past two Fridays, each one focusing in on a specific type of app, have proven so popular that I’m doing it again. Today, it’s all about free utility apps. Remember that free apps may include in-app purchase (IAP) options or be ad-supported, but given that these apps have been given very high ratings by MANY consumers, where IAP links or ads are present they must be pretty unobtrusive. Descriptions below are from the apps’ product pages. Calculator Plus Free – for Fire tablet – I’m Calculator Plus – the perfect calculator for Kindle Fire. I remember everything you calculate, and let you review it anytime, making me perfect for adding up receipts, balancing checkbooks, or even calculating taxes. Calculator Free – for all Android devices – Calculator Free combines the Normal and Scientific calculator for Free! Final Countdown – Count…

Fire Tablet Keyboard Now Includes Full-Color Emoji

A recent software update has brought full-color Emoji icons to the Fire tablet and Fire phone keyboards! Note that I haven’t tested this feature on all Fire tablets, so it may not be supported in first- and second-generation models. I’ll let the pictures tell the story (tap or click on images to view an enlarged version in a new tab or window). Begin by opening your Fire keyboard. Tap the lower left-hand key (red arrow below) to open the numbers and symbols keyboard. On the numbers and symbols keyboard, tap the smiley face key (red arrow below) to open the Emoji keyboard. By default, the Emoji keyboard opens on the ‘most recently used’ tab (red arrow below), where your most recently-used Emoji will be available for your convenience. Each of the other colored arrows below points to a category of Emoji, and as you can see, there are a LOT! The selected…

Facebook Share Changes

* * * the Toshiba Satellite C55-C5240 15.6 Inch Laptop w/ 1 Terabyte Hard Drive, currently on sale at 25% off Amazon (as of 6/16/15). Advertisers make it possible for Digital Media Mom to bring you great content each day for free, so thanks for your support. * * * Facebook’s Made Some Changes – AGAIN! Just about the only constant with Facebook is change, and this week I’m seeing changes to how Sharing works. I don’t really get why these changes were made, but it probably has to do with making the site more mobile-friendly. In a nutshell, the whole Sharing process now occurs right on the page of the thing you’re Sharing, and the pop-up boxes involved in the process are smaller. One thing I definitely don’t like about the new Sharing is that you can no longer see a preview of your share before sharing it, and you don’t get…

New Kindle Reader Feature: Word Wise

* * * the Kindle Paperwhite, a terrific e-reader pick for folks who want a crisp display and features like long battery life, glare-free display (even in sunlight), bookmarks, notes, the ability to change font size and so on, but who aren’t quite ready to step up to the costlier Kindle Voyage. Advertisers make it possible for Digital Media Mom to bring you great content each day for free, so thanks for your support. * * * Amazon has quietly rolled out another great enhancement for Kindle books on Kindle e-reader devices (but not Fire tablets or in the Kindle Reader app at this point), and you may have noticed it on some Kindle book product pages: Word Wise. Since it’s so new it’s still not common, but you will find it on new Kindle book releases more and more often as publishers get on board. In a Word Wise -enabled book,…

How To Stop Amazon From Sharing Your Phone Number With Outside Sellers

* * * Amazon’s current, limited-time sale on the Kindle (normally $79, currently $59), Kindle Paperwhite (normally $99, currently $79), Fire HD7 (normally $139, currently $99) and Fire HD Kids’ Edition (normally $149, currently $124). Advertisers make it possible for Digital Media Mom to bring you great content each day for free, so thanks for your support. * * * How Did You Get This Number? I recently bought some Visage Instant Lift wrinkle serum on Amazon, and it was one of those “fulfilled by Amazon” deals where the seller is an outside company but Amazon handles the order processing. I’ve been very happy with the serum (and despite the incident that follows will most likely order it again), but about a week after it arrived I started getting calls from the seller at home, on the same phone number I have listed with Amazon. I wrote the first call off as random telemarketing, but noticed a reference to my…

Gmail’s Last Account Activity Feature Shows Who’s Been Accessing Your Account

* * * Today’s post is brought to you by ESET Smart Security, the tech security product I’ve used and trusted for many years. Advertisers make it possible for Digital Media Mom to bring you great content each day for free, so thanks for your support. * * * Worried Someone’s Been Mucking About In Your Gmail Account? Whether your concern is over a potential hack or a snooping partner or family member, if you use Gmail there’s an easy way to tell if anyone other than you has been accessing your email: Last Account Activity. To access this amazingly wonderful and helpful Gmail feature, scroll to the bottom of your inbox and look for the Last Account Activity Details link (tap or click on images to view an enlarged version in a new browser tab or window). When you click on that link, you’re shown a listing of the times…

What’s In The January 2015 Loot Crate

What’s Loot Crate? Loot Crate is a monthly subscription service that delivers a box filled with theme-of-the-month awesomeness to your door each month for $13.37 + S&H (which is about $6 anywhere in the contintental U.S., though they also ship to other countries), and the contents are guaranteed to have a minimum retail value of $40. Even though it’s a subscription service, there’s no minimum subscription period and it’s very easy to cancel your subscription at any time—the Loot Crate site’s FAQ page has a direct link to their cancellation page. Digital Media Mom Takes One For The Team This is Digital Media Mom, where I am all about getting my money’s worth and would never personally recommend a product or service that doesn’t meet my very high standards for quality and value. I’ve put up my own money to become a subscriber so I would be able to tell you myself whether or not…

Laptop vs. Netbook: When You Want A Laptop, Don’t Get A Netbook By Mistake

* * * the Toshiba Satellite C55-B5287 15.6-Inch Laptop (Windows 7), currently being offered at 21% off on Amazon. Advertisers make it possible for Digital Media Mom to bring you great content each day for free, so thanks for your support. * * * Netbook vs. Laptop: What’s a Netbook, Anyway? It used to be that when you bought a laptop you knew exactly what you were getting: essentially, a portable version of a desktop computer. Then Netbooks came along late in the 90’s: machines that looked like laptops, but were typically smaller and had very little memory or ability to run programs because they were primarily built for web surfing, email and little else. The Netbook never really took off and eventually faded away. But more recently, Netbooks are back — they’re just not being called Netbooks anymore, for the most part.

How To Delete GameCircle Progress & Other App Save Files To Start Over

* * * Where Did I Put It?, the easy-to-use app from Digital Media Mom that should make keeping track of those Easter goodies—or anything else you’ve temporarily moved, lent or hidden—a snap! Advertisers make it possible for Digital Media Mom to bring you great content each day for free, so thanks for your support. * * * Lately I’ve noticed a lot of new visitors to the site end up here after doing an internet search on “Delete GameCircle progress”, so even though I’ve posted on the topic before I figured it might be time to address it again. Clearing stored game progress on most game apps is as simple as uninstalling the app, re-downloading it from wherever you originally got it, and re-installing it. Doing this should install a “fresh” copy of most game apps, but there are some exceptions and GameCircle games are among them.

Premera Blue Cross Hack + Google Feud

* * * Digital Media Mom’s Spring Break Special: Half Off ALL DMM Apps on Amazon. Advertisers make it possible for Digital Media Mom to bring you great content each day for free, so thanks for your support. * * * Another Day, Another Scary Hack… I’m getting really tired of having to be the bearer of bad news, but if I have information that could help some of my readers I feel a responsibility to share. But since this hack affects a relatively limited population (consumers whose healthcare provider is Premera / Premera Blue Cross), I’ll keep it short and just provide some links for those who may be affected and need to know more. On 3/17/15 Wired reported: In the case of Premera… the attackers not only had access to birth dates, member ID numbers, bank account info and Social Security numbers, they also may have obtained medical claims records…