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Best Coupon Sites to Save Your Money

Elena — Thu, 16 May 2013 09:42:37 +0000

Any of us isn’t against saving a couple of dollars on the things we want to buy. That’s why discount coupons are so popular. If several years ago, we had to cut out coupons from newspapers or magazines, now we have dozens of websites offering all kinds of coupons. And it’s not hard to benefit from them: just register an account and start saving money! Let’s have a look at the coupon resources which attract most customers.

1. Coupons.com

Coupons.com is the largest provider of digital coupons in the United States. It has thousands of affiliates promoting their deals every day. Here you can find coupons almost for everything – grocery, beverages, footwear, clothing, cosmetics, etc. All you need is just enter your zip code to see local deals, then select desired coupons, and print them to show at a local store or purchase something online. There are also Coupons.com apps for iPhone/iPad and Android.

2. RetailMeNot

RetailMeNot is another leading marketplace for online coupons and deals. It offers a respectable amount of coupon codes, printable coupons, and free-shipping offers. In all, the site has coupons for 130,000 online and local stores. RetailMeNot is also a huge community of users who can vote for the deals, leave feedback, and submit other local coupons they’ve found to the site. For savings on the go, you can download RetailMeNot app for iPhone/iPad and Android. You may also subscribe to the “Hot Coupon Newsletter” to receive all the latest tips on discounts.

3. Valpak

Valpak is one of the biggest names in coupons. The company has been operating since 1968 as direct mail advertising service familiar to most Americans due to their blue envelopes (they are still sent to households in North America). However, everyone can easily find the same and even more deals online at Valpak’s site. Just enter your ZIP code to see deals near you. There are dozens of printable coupons you can take to the grocery store, restaurants, dentists, salons, auto repair shops, etc. You may also load savings onto your smartphone with the Valpak Local Savings app for Android and iPhone.

4. Groupon

Groupon.com is a bit different from the above described websites. Here you won’t get printable coupons for free to show them at your local shop, but will have to pay for the discounted product or service immediately. Once you have purchased at Groupon, you will receive an email with a link to sign in and print your coupon for yourself or as a gift. You can also refer friends to Groupon and when they sign-up, you will receive a $10 Groupon credit. Groupon.com serves over 150 cities in North American and over 100 cities in Europe, Asia and South America.

5. Ebates

Ebates is the pioneer and leader of online cash back shopping – it rewards you for shopping through their portal. They partner with around 1,000 merchant stores from which you can earn up to 25% cash back of your purchase price (though most return between 3% to 10%). You can even buy deals at Groupon via Ebates. Bonuses may be used for further purchases or can be automatically donated to your favorite charity if you don’t intend to use them.

6. Savings.com

Savings.com have dozens of coupon codes for almost any things you want, making it simpler to find and share big savings from all your favorite brands and stores. On this site you can easily navigate from category to category for all your shopping needs or just use the search box if you’re looking for a particular deal. You can even become a deal expert by contributing tips and great deals to a community of other shoppers. Savings.com also have a blog where they post tips on how to better save money online.

7. CouponCabin

CouponCabin is a good site “couponing newbies”, as it offers a lot of studying and support facilities (CouponCabin University, live chart, FAQs) . Benefit from CouponCabin’s 100,000+ coupons. The website owners claim that their team tests the coupons daily and can guarantee many of them. On this site you can find codes for every major retailer, grocery coupons and printable coupons for local merchants, more than 35,000 stores are represented. There is Freebies section with best give-aways from big and local retailers and manufacturers. Apps for iPhone and Android are also available.

Mark Zuckerberg Quotes: 8 Remarkable Sayings of Facebook CEO

Victoria — Tue, 14 May 2013 11:33:05 +0000

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg turns 29 this May. Regardless of his young age, some of Mark’s quotes have already become trendy like famous sayings by Steve Jobs. Growing Facebook from a school dorm to 1 billion users company, Mark Zuckerberg changed the way we communicate and established a new vision of social life. Here’s the most rumored thoughts of Mark about technology, success, privacy, and money.

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See more

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Mark Zuckerberg about trust

At the early days of Facebook Mark bragged about the tons of important info that users entrusted to Facebook:

I have over 4000 emails, pictures, addresses, etc. People just submitted it. I don’t know why they “trust me” …

Mark Zuckerberg on success

From the start Mark clearly stated that he’s a successful businessman declaring on his Facebook business card:

I’m CEO, Bitch.

Mark Zuckerberg on inspiration

To inspire Facebook employees there’s a huge sign on a office wall which reflects Facebook and Mark’s philosophy:

-Done is better than perfect
-What would you do if you weren’t afraid?
-Move fast and break things

Mark Zuckerberg on social networking

Mark’s attitude to the new way of online social networking:

Our mission is to make the world more open and connected. We do this by giving people the power to share whatever they want and be connected to whoever they want, no matter where they are.

Mark Zuckerberg about Facebook

Explaining the real story behind Facebook company vs what was shown in The Social Network movie Mark said:

I mean, the real story is actually probably pretty boring, right? I mean, we just sat at our computers for six years and coded.

Mark Zuckerberg about privacy

Mark emphasizes sharing over privacy approach in future:

Three years from now, people are going to be sharing 8 to 10 times as much stuff. We’d better be there, because if we’re not, some other service will be.

Mark Zuckerberg about money

Simply put: we don’t build services to make money; we make money to build better services. And we think this is a good way to build something.

Mark Zuckerberg on social media

The role of social media now, as Mark Zuckerberg sees it:

At Facebook, we’re inspired by technologies that have revolutionized how people spread and consume information. We often talk about inventions like the printing press and the television — by simply making communication more efficient, they led to a complete transformation of many important parts of society. They gave more people a voice. They encouraged progress. They changed the way society was organized. They brought us closer together.

Sources: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

Best Tech Gift Ideas for Mother’s Day 2013

Selin — Thu, 09 May 2013 13:10:54 +0000

Mother’s day is approaching and if you haven’t decided what present to buy for your great mom to make her “awww”, then check our tech gift ideas for any pocket.

Photo Cookbook – Baking

Is your mom fond of cooking and, in particular, baking? Has she got an iPad/iPhone? If you answered “yes” to both questions, then Photo Cookbook is what you need. It’s a simple application with more than 60 amazing recipes and 500+ photos. Your mom just need to pick the one she likes and start following the recipe. Each recipe is very easy to follow. Your mom may also tap on an ingredient to learn more about it.

Download Photo Cookbook for iPad/iPhone for $3.99

New iPhone Case

What can be better than a new accessory? Especially if this accessory combines beauty and comfort. Present your mom with this smart iPhone 5 case and let her keep her phone, credit cards and money on the go. The case has a special slot for 3 cards and some paper money or folded bills. It looks cool and stylish and is available in 5 colors: red, green, purple, black, and grey. Which one would you choose?

Buy SmartFlex Card Case for iPhone 5 for $29.53

Headphone Necklace

I bet your mom likes to listen to music. Thus you may give her a limited edition CD of her favorite band and this gorgeous headphone necklace. It comes in different styles, so you’ll definitely find something that your mom will like. The necklaces inclides an in line microphone with on/off switch for handsfree talking on the phone and a 26″ extender that makes it possible to keep a phone or MP3 player in a pocket or bag.

Buy Stereo Headphone Necklace for $39.99

Yourshape Fintess

An ideal present for a fit mom who doesn’t have enough time to go to a gym, but has an Xbox at home. Present her with “Your Shape Fitness” sport video game. More than 90 hours of activities, including Boot Camp, Cardio Boxing, Jump Rope and even a medley of Dance classes. Your mom can keep track of her overall progress, set objectives and take a fitness quiz, or go online to share her sport progress with the community.

Buy Your Shape Fitness Evolved for $21.36

Like/Dislike Stamp Set

Is your mom a big boss and a Facebook fan? Then, why not giving here this funny stamp set? If your mom and her colleagues have good sense of humor, they’ll for sure appreciate it. Let your mom “Like” good reports and important documents and “Dislike” those that are not correct and need further rework.

Buy Like/Dislike Stamp Set for $12.99

7 Best Zip Code Sites: Find Your Area Postal Code Easily

Elena — Tue, 07 May 2013 08:47:07 +0000

Do you know your exact address? What about zip code? For me it’s always a problem to remember these impossible figures! That’s why I often search for my area zip code on the Web when I need to buy something online or just register a new account. Here are several good zip code sites I discovered, which are quick to provide a postal code for any location.

Global

Wikipedia

Wiki has a good list of zip code resources for any area. Here are listed even those countries which don’t have postal codes yet. The links lead to the related Wiki articles with zip codes for a certain location. It’s also important that Wikipedia provides the information about zip code format (letter, number, or combined).

Geo Post Codes

This is a free database of 5.8 million zip codes for 127 countries. To get yours, just choose a country, then region and city, and verify a post code by clicking on the coordinates. You’ll be given a full list of areas for a particular code. A bit uncomfortable since you might need to check multiple codes before finding yours. Still it’s one of rare sites with all locations zip codes.

USA

US Postal Service

To find a zip code with USPS.com, you need to fill in the fields with your USA street address, city, and state. Then click “Find” and you’ll get your postal code. There is also a tab to get zip code for a company.

United States Zip Codes

Start looking for a postal code with entering your address into the search field, this may be just a city, then go to the map and upscale it to find your area. This site is ideal to find an area code if you don’t know the exact address.

City Data

This site provides not only zip codes, but the information about the area: population, resident age, unemployment rate, family income, real estate prices, etc. To find a zip code, you may either use a custom search (any address query) or a map.

UK

Royal Mail

Enter your street address and town or city and click “Find postcode”. Everything is fast and easy! Note that UK zip codes have a special format with outward (postcode area) and inward (postal district) parts.

Postoffice.co.uk

This site has a similar design and works in the same way as the previous one.

If you know other good sites to find a zip code, please share them in the comments below.

* Image source

Top 5 Free FLV Players

Selin — Thu, 02 May 2013 14:10:43 +0000

FLV is a popular video format that can be easily called a standard format for online video streaming and found on such well-known video sharing sites as YouTube, Vevo, Metacafe and many more. Flash video is viewable in most web browsers. However, if you want to download FLV video, you can’t do without FLV converter in order to reproduce the video with a regular PC player. Alternatively, you may use a special FLV player to watch FLV videos without re-encoding. Have at look at these 5 free FLV players and choose the one you like most.

Applian FLV Player

Applian FLV Player is a simple media player for watching FLV movies and videos. The software has an easy-to-use interface attractive both for proficient users and beginners. Just add FLV videos via drag-n-drop and right-click on the player to see all the possible options. The program also allows its users to handle and create playlists and use a number of filters to adjust various audio and video effects. Moveover, FLV can play other formats such as AVI, MKV, MP4, WMV, 3GP, CD and DVD. The only thing worth remembering is that being a free software, Applian FLV Player is ad-supported and will offer you third-party programs during the installation. Thus if you don’t need them, don’t forget to deselect the options.

FLV Player

FLV Player is a good solution for playing FLV movies downloaded from the Web. It’s small, fast but gives qualitative playback. FLV player features a simple user-friendly interface with drag-n-drop support. If you want, you may check video metadata right from the player or watch the movie in full-screen. In fact, these are the only options of free FLV player. However, if the only thing you need is to play FLV videos free, FLV player is a very good choice.

Moyea FLV Player

Moyea FLV Player is one more software that you can use to play FLV video files on your hard drive or from the Web. The program allows you to create playlist and add videos in Favorites. It also lets replay FLV files from wherever you stopped them last time. Moyea FLV Player’s interface is also pretty simple and provides you with only necessary options. The player supports multiple playing modes such as like full screen, shuffle, and single repeat.

Sothink FLV Player

Sothink FLV Player, also called Flash Video Player, is another option to reproduce FLV files. It’s simple to use, light in size and supports a lot of codecs for FLV videos. However, you can’t play any other video extensions with this software. The image quality is really great comparing to many free FLV players. But, of course, it depends on the original quality of the video you download from YouTube. As for the options, Sothink FLV Player provides a very usual set of functions for playback . No additional features are available.

Riva FLV Player

Riva FLV Player is a small application created for FLV videos playback. You can “pin” the player on the top of other windows and enjoy your video while chatting or doing something else. The interface is pretty simple with 3 buttons only. However, it doesn’t put a crimp into its main purpose. Riva FLV Player can also play other video formats in case you have all the necessary codecs on your PC. We found only one serious minus in this software – no full screen support.

Best Websites to Watch Anime in 2013

Selin — Tue, 30 Apr 2013 14:33:59 +0000

Anime is Japanese animated production that features hand-drawn or computer animation and includes television series, short and full-length films. As usual movies, anime features a great variety of genres, thus you are sure to find something you’ll like. We prepared a roundup of best sites where you can watch and download anime for free.

Animefreak

Animefreak is a very popular site among devoted anime fans. The site contains a huge list of series and films placed in alphabetical order. However, you can also browse anime films by genre, check for latest episodes and most popular videos. Majority of videos are provided in the Japanese language with English subtitles. If you can speak Japanese very well, you may easily turn off English subtitles or use Japanese ones where available using “T’ button in the player.

Anilinkz

Anilinkz also features a lot of videos for any taste. You may check for new anime to watch in “Movies” or “Cartoon” sections. In case you don’t know what to want, go to “random” section and try any video the site will offer you. Subscribe to the latest ongoing episodes and don’t miss your favorite series. Anilinkz also has a forum where you can get in touch with other anime fans, read the latest news and ask any related questio ns.

Anime44

Despite of its simple design, Anime44 is given a 3d place in this roundup due to its rich collection of manga and anime videos. Go to the site, open “Anime list” and start browsing for numerous films. If you don’t remember the entire title of the movie, you can type the word your remember in search field. The site will provide with all the result that match the word. You can also check such sections as ongoing, recent, new, completed.

Animeshippuuden

Animeshippuuden is also famous among anime and manga amateurs. The plus of the site is its “most views” and “most Facebook likes” ranking lists which allow users to check which of the site videos got the highest point. Thus, you may start your search for new anime experience right from these videos. As all the previous sites, Animeshippuuden provides its users with a list of all the videos and genres it hosts. Moreover, you may enter a Dub section and watch your favorite anime in English.

Animehere

And finally, the last but not the least, comes Animerehere. The site looks pretty cute and contains a lot of videos and manga to enjoy during your free time. Check for Top Anime to see the best movies or browse “2013 Anime” for the latest ones. Choose anime by genre, by name or by year. To make your experience better Animerehere placed top 20 best anime movies and series in the right center part, so you’ll hardly miss it.

Hope, you liked these sites. Don’t forget that you can easily download any anime you want to watch from these sites with free Freemake Video Downloader.

What is HDTV – Everything You Need to Know About it [FAQ]

Elena — Thu, 25 Apr 2013 09:20:25 +0000

Today the abbreviation “HD” is known almost to everyone. And it’s clear why: the notion “high definition” is applied to everything more or less associated with video production or playback – smartphones, camcorders, monitors, glasses, etc. But most often we hear about high-definition television, or HDTV. Let’s figure out what it is and find answers to the most popular questions about HDTV.

1. What is HDTV?

HDTV, standing for high-definition television, is a new means of television broadcasting and the machines that take advantage of it. HDTV broadcasts video digitally (in contrast to the common analog formats PAL, NTSC, and SECAM) and of higher 720 pixels or 1080 pixels resolution.

2. How is HDTV different from standard analog television?

First, HDTVs have a higher resolution than analog sets: 1280×720 pixels or 1920×1080 versus 720×480 pixels. So HDTVs can display images with far more detail, better picture color, clarity, and sharp, lifelike images than traditional TVs can.

Secondly, since HDTV is digitally broadcast, it requires less bandwidth due to digital video compression. Plus, HDTV screens are about one-third wider than existing TV screens. HDTV screens closely match the peripheral vision range of the human eye, so they are more natural to watch.

3. What’s the difference between HD Ready and Full HD TV sets?

HD Ready sets have a lower screen resolution, at about 720p. Whereas Full HD sets are all above 1080p (or 1080i if interlaced). HD Ready sets will all work with your HD devices or broadcaster signal, but they will downgrade the signal to the 720p resolution, if it is transmitted at 1080. However, on smaller television sets (48″ or less) you will not really notice the difference.

4. What equipment is needed for HDTV?

Before you can watch your HDTV, you have to connect it to something that will give it a signal to display. This can be a cable or satellite receiver, an antenna, a DVD player, a game console or a combination of devices. It all depends on which electronic devices you own and how many of them you want to use with your TV. However, not everything that you watch on your TV is made for HDTV. Sometimes you need to buy a special HD package from your satellite provider or switch to particular HD channels.

5. Do I need to calibrate HDTV?

You can easily deal without any HDTV calibration, since most modern HDTV sets have settings already adjusted to different types of TV shows. In addition, some higher-end HDTVs are built with sensors inside that take measurements of the environment and adjust the settings accordingly. For example, an HDTV might measure how much light is in the room and adjust the brightness or contrast of the picture to give the best possible image.

Still if you do decide to calibrate and you opt not to have a professional technician do it for you, you can calibrate your HDTV by purchasing a calibration DVD ($20) and proceed with its instructions.

6. How is it possible to record HDTV?

There are two ways to record HDTV broadcast depending on what HDTV set you have. Some modern HDTVs already have the option to video recording, so you just need to input a USB stick in order to save recordings. If your HDTV can boast of such a function, you’ll have to buy an additional equipment – a hard disk recorder, DVD recorder with ATSC tuner, Blu-ray recorder.

7. How to convert HDTV to other video format?

HDTV recordings are usually saved in specific HD formats which are hardly reproduced by common video players, so you can’t de without re-encoding. To convert HDTV to other format, follow our guide “How to convert HD video” with Freemake Video Converter. It supports all popular HD video formats and lets transform them into AVI, MKV, MP4, WMV without HD quality loss.

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Check also:

How to Connect iPad to TV

How to Burn Video Blu-ray
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Best Free Sites for Puzzle Solving

Selin — Tue, 23 Apr 2013 09:20:37 +0000

Finally the weather is fine and you may go outside and enjoy fresh air. If you are not among those who can sit under the Sun doing nothing, then turn on your laptop and check these free puzzle sites to train your brain.

Puzzles.com

Puzzles.com is one of the most popular puzzle site all over the Web. The site contains thousands of various puzzles for any taste. Choose a category: manipulative puzzles, non-manipulative, interactive puzzles or illusions/tricks/toys. Each category has sub-folders, choose the one to your liking and start using your brain. Puzzles.com offers daily and monthly puzzles, so you can be sure that you’ll always have something to solve. You may also shop for real puzzles.com puzzles from their website.

JSPuzzles

JSPuzzles.com is no less famous and can feed your brain with a great variety of riddles. Solve classical piece puzzles from such categories as nature, art, animals, buildings etc. Choose between small and large pieces and then the number of them. If you don’t have enough experience you’d better select 16 or 25 pieces and then increase the number while you get more and more professional. You’ll see the best time result near each puzzle. Will you beat it?

Jigzone

Jigzone.com is one more great place for having intellectual fun. It woks almost as jspuzzles. Choose a picture, a number of pieces and try to solve the puzzle as fast as you can. When you are done, you may share your result with friends or even upload your own photo as a puzzle for other members. Jigzone also provides its users with categories to choose from and daily puzzles. The number of pieces varies from 6 to 247. Which one is the best for you?

Bestforpuzzles

Bestforpuzzles.com is a place for crosswords lovers. Here you may find quick and cryptic crosswords, sudoku, cross number puzzles and even anagrams. The site has an easy-to-use help section in case you have difficulties with solving this or that crossword. The only problem is that if you don’t have java installed on your notebook, you’ll have to install it to enjoy the bestforpuzzles crosswords.

Mypuzzle

Mypuzzle.org is a great site for any puzzle fan. You can find a great many puzzles here and also enjoy professional graphics and the cute way they are made. Play sliding puzzles, sudoku, jigsaw puzzles, point-and-click and physical based ones. Mypuzzle can also offer such games as bubble shooter, wobbies, gems, bricks breaking and a famous iPad Sheep game. Choose a category you like most and we’are sure you won’t notice how time flies.

8 Best Sites with Free Sheet Music, Guitar Tabs & Chords

Elena — Thu, 18 Apr 2013 09:58:01 +0000

You may download music from YouTube, upload songs to your iPod or MP3 player, listen to them with Music Box, but nothing will replace playing live music. I’ve never been good at music and I’ve always envied those people who can play a musical instrument – piano, guitar, violin, etc. They can easily play any song they want, just using music sheets and their inner talent.

There are numerous sites offering all kinds of sheet music, guitar tabs, chords, piano notes for beginners and amateur musicians. Still it took me much time to sort out really easy-to-use and free resources which I’m glad to share with you.

Sheet Music & Piano Notes

1. 8notes

8notes offers free sheet music downloads for piano, guitar, violin, flute, viola, cello, percussion, etc. Just choose your instrument and browse for free sheet music available in GIF and PDF (requires $20 year subscription) formats. The entire track could be also saved in MP3 or MIDI format. If you’re looking for something particular, just use the music notes search. However, not all of music scores (especially full versions) are free, 8notes may refer you to other sites like SheetMusicPlus.com. Still all classical works are free, plus users may upload and share their own sheet music.

2. MuseScore

MuseScore is first of all a handy software that allows users to create, play and print sheet music. However, if you need only sheet music, you don’t need to download and install the program. Just go to Sheet Music section and find whatever you want. Sheet music is available for free download in PDF and Music XML formats. You may also register an account to be able to upload and share your own sheet music.

3. FreeScores

This site is in French, but you may easily use Google Translate or directly go to the search box and find the sheet music you need. There are thousands of free sheet music downloads in PDF format, available for all popular instruments. The collection is especially rich in classical music pieces.

4. IMSLP / Petrucci Music Library

IMSLP is a good resource of public domain sheet music, as well as a community of music lovers. There are over 235K scores for 66,000+ works and thousands are being added every month. You will find here multiple versions of sheets for popular works, all available for download as PDFs. To find and save a sheet music, just use the search box or look for scores by composer name or genre, then go to the work page and download the PDF file.

5. PopSheets4U

This is a small and not very popular site of sheet music, but pop music fans will definitely love it for a nice collection of pop music notes. All the singers and bands are listed in the alphabetic order, so you can easily find your favorite songs. To save a sheet, you just need to right-click the song title and choose “Save the link as…”. All the files come from another site - ffpianomelody.com.

Guitar Tabs & Chords

1. GuitarTabs.cc

GuitarTabs.cc offers a great deal of free tabs and chords for guitar, bass, or drum. The search is quick and easy. Plus users may submit their own tabs. The only inconvenience I found is the absence of Print or Download button, so that users have to copy and paste the song into a document in order to save or print it.

2. Ultimate-Guitar.com

This is a stock of free guitar tabs and a blog about music with lots of reviews, interviews, news, lessons, etc. To get guitar tabs for a desired song, just use the search option and choose a version that you need. There is Print button below the song, so you can easily start practicing. The resource also have apps for iOS and Android.

3. GuitareTab.com

GuitarTab is a popular site hosting thousands of free guitar chords. Everything is simple and fast: you enter a song or a band name into the search box and go to what you were looking for. Tabs may be easily printed. It’s also possible to view chord diagrams in case you can’t recollect some of them and listen to the original song on Jango.