This is a guest post by Paul from BroadbandExpert.com.  He shares with us several ways to tell if a high speed internet provider is a good choice.  You’ll notice that these tips are good while looking for almost any service provider so I am sure this article will be of some help to you!

The internet has brought about ease to many transactions we do. This is because the internet has proved to be a very fast means of sending information across long distances and places. Most of the things that were done with days and sweat in the absence of the internet are now done very easily on the internet, such as mail correspondence, money transfer and so on.

The success of doing something very fast on the internet can be determined by the type of internet provider you use. If you are a high speed internet user and you want to know what makes a good high speed internet provider then you are in the right place.

There is a lot to benefit from using a good high speed internet provider but you need a way to know whether your high speed internet provider is good or not. How can this be done without stress? In this article, we will be giving you four major tests to help you find a good high speed internet provider.

Bundle Plan Offers (unlimited data)

This is a formula of broadband internet whereby you don’t pay per the amount of data you transfer or send and receive. This option makes it easy for you to be able to pay for your internet connection without the fear of running into debt. It also makes it possible for you to be able to predict your budget before the month runs out and allows you the opportunity to save more money. If your high speed internet provider does not offer you the option to make your payments by purchasing bundle plans, then you can do with a better high speed internet provider. Good broadband high speed internet providers should have great and effective bundle plans available to everybody and not make you waste your hard-earned money browsing the internet.

Popularity

A good high speed internet provider should have a level of popularity that commands respect. The value of the service a high speed internet provider offers its client would determine how popular it will be. If a high speed internet provider is not popular, it probably means they don’t offer good services that will increase their popularity among people. When you are going to choose a good high speed internet provider, make sure that high speed internet provider is popular to a substantial level. A high speed internet provider that has no image to save itself can do unbelievable things. But a popular high speed internet provider that has a good reputation to save will surely do everything at its reach to save the good name it has earned itself.

Good Customer Support

The level of customer support a high speed internet provider offers should be very high before it is considered a good high speed internet provider. The way a high speed internet provider handles its customers should be respectable and of good standard. If your internet provider does not treat you well as a customer, then there is something wrong somewhere and you need to act before it gets out of hand. Before you consider going for a high speed internet provider, you need to consider how good their customer support is.

Quality of Service Offered

A good high speed internet provider should be able to fulfill the promise of good quality service to its customer before it is considered a good high speed internet provider. There should be stability in service rendered and the assurance that such good service will continue in the future. If there is no stability in the service your high speed internet provider is rendering you, you are better off with a good high speed internet provider that can promise you stability in service. If you want to know whether a high speed internet provider is a good one, you should try to know the quality of service it renders its customers.

This guest article was written by Paul who helps you learn how to choose the best broadband high speed internet providers

I think it was shortly before the mid-90′s that the Internet began to really take off.  I remember the days of dial-up.  We learned that we can do cool things like send messages across the world using email and look cool stuff up without opening a single encyclopedia.

There weren’t that many ISPs around and AOL was one of the biggest.  I remember trying to get a hold of the “24 hour” customer service.  As I recall it was a whole day’s chore.  Anyway, for those of you who remember the days of AOL dial-up and 10 free hours of online, here’s a commercial to bring you back:

Yeah, those were the days.  Just think of where we were and where we are today.

What about bulletin boards?  Don’t call me old but I actually remember using BBS back in the day:

However, if you watch that video and can remember when it was so, and it dates you, check out this next video about the “future” of the newspaper from 1989:

Two hours and five bucks?  LOL!  It seems that it was the newspapers that began the push to put their content online.  Now the Internet is giving many of them a run for their money!

If that takes you back, watch this video from the 60′s guess how the home computer and the Internet will change the home:

I hope you enjoyed these videos as much as I did.  What a blast from the past.  What is your earliest memory of the Internet?

Some time ago I wrote an article about using Google to look up health issues and symptoms.  I bring up this topic once again because I ran into this article about a girl who figured out her own diagnosis after years of doctors struggling over it. She apparently was in AP high school science class and put a tissue sample of her intestine under a microscope and came upon the problem. Way to go, Jessica!

I bring this up not only because the article interested me, but also to make the point that doctors are as human as we are. Sometimes they do all they can but there are limits. They are in many cases heroes but they aren’t superheroes and they definitely are not gods (small “g”). I do have to mention that they are professionals who have been extensively trained to diagnose and hopefully treat illness, etc. A good read is this article about the dangers of self-diagnosis and the importance of consulting a doctor in some cases.  In fact, it lists two dangers of self-diagnosis so check it out.

There are, on the other hand, many places to go on the Internet to find help diagnosing simple or minor ailments and can help you when to decide to see a doctor. I feel the need to state it again because of the importance, SEE a doctor if you have ANY question of the seriousness of the illness or disease especially in light of any preexisting conditions. These sites, as I would explain it, should be used as supplemental tools to add to your health-arsenal. They may even help you find out when to seek professional assistance. Here’s a list of sites I’ve come across:

1. WrongDiagnosis.com
2. yourdiagnosis.com
3. ECureMe.com
4. Symptom Flowchart on FamilyDoctor.org

Although there are dangers associated with self-diagnosis, I believe it is very important to be proactive in knowing what’s going on with your own health. Some of the listed sites can also help you know some good questions to ask your doctor during your next appointment.

Today, it being Firefox Friday and all, I want to share with you another FireFox add-on I’ve started using called “Web Of Trust” or WOT.

I don’t remember how I came across the WOT add-on, but it was probably the Google alert I set up in Google reader to alert me via RSS whenever “Firefox” shows up somewhere on the internet.  However, since I found it, I’ve fallen in love with the idea.

Basically, WOT offers website ratings to give you an idea of how trustworthy the site is before you visit it.  It rates according to the following categories: trustworthiness, vendor reliability, privacy, and child safety.  Their primary source of the ratings is from other users rating sites, however they also use other “carefully chosen” trusted sources such as PhishTank to help protect users from new, rapidly spreading threats.

Here’s a demonstration video showing how it works:

I encourage you to check out the WOT About Us page to get a better understanding of what WOT is all about, and then download the WOT add-on for Firefox and use it!

Once you have the add-on installed, learn how to rate sites and help out the system!

Common back next Friday for Firefox Friday!

Do you remember the post from a while ago called “How I Get Almost Any Question I Have Answered Using The Internet“?  Well, last night a quick question came up so I figured I give a working example of how I come across answers.

Well, there were actually two questions: “Is the idea that it is unhealthy to eat right before bed a misnomer?” and “Was ‘misnomer’ used correctly in that sentence?”  Here is what I did to answer those two questions.

1. Define: Misnomer – to do this, I headed over to Wiktionary.com
   • Enter “wiktionary” into address bar and hit Ctrl+Enter (a nice little short cut I learned from my friend George Carpenter):
     
   • Type “misnomer” into search box provided:
     
   • Wictionary.com gives the list of possible definitions and gives examples of each.  Then, as you can see, it gives “Usage notes” giving possible usages of the word (very handy for getting a feel of the many ways a word can be defined and used):
     
2. Research: Is it really unhealthy to eat right before bed?
   • I hit Yahoo.com up for this answer (I know, I know, Google is better!  I’m still using Yahoo for this example!):
     
   • I entered “eating befor bed” into the search field (I put the words in quotes so yahoo would search for occurrences of the phrase):
     
   • I then got a list of sites containing the phrase I was searching for.  The first link seems like it might have some answers:
     
   • As you can see from this screen shot, this site breaks the answer down for us:
     
     • Does the Timing of Meals Matter?
     • Timing of Meals and Weight
     • Other Health Effects
     • Eating at Night: a Real Disease?
     • The Bottom Line

There you have it, a quick example of how easy the internet makes it to find answers!  Please remember, when doing research, it is always good to find multiple sources of information to get more of a consesus of whether or not an answer is accurate.  For more tools for researching answers, revisit “How I Get Almost Any Question I Have Answered Using The Internet“!

Technology and the internet has been changing dramatically in the last few years. A term that comes up often these days is “cloud computing” or “computing in the cloud.”  In fact, the topic came up with my last “techie” interview with Mark Bouchard when I asked him is opinion about the future of computers.  I found this video on YouTube helping to explain the principles behind “cloud Computing.”

One example I use is Google Docs.  Google Docs removes the need for having a word processor on your computer.  Now you can go online and do your typing and even share it with others and even collaborate on projects!

Cloud computing hasn’t totally taken over everything yet.  There are some issues that need some work including (but probably not limited to) data security, availability of bandwidth across the globe, and the ability to totally replace all local computing (for instance, there may be some features of Microsoft Word that are a little different to use in an online clone like Google Docs).

There is a possibility that cloud computing will take over how we do things and the computers we use in our homes may not need to be as robust and powerful because the computing power will be handled elsewhere.

As it turns out, if you don’t get you head INTO the clouds, you may just be left behind!

See also the post: Photo Editing From Your Browser

As a parent, have you ever felt “left behind” or “in the dark” when it comes to today’s technology that our youth are so dependent on?  As you seek to stay connected with your children and to understand what they are up to, I found a blog that I believe can help!

WiredParentPad.com is run by a man named Jamie Pick, who apparently has been in the Information Technology field for 10 years and is a parent of 2 teenage boys.

He describes the mission of his site:

At WiredParentPad, I share my personal experiences, advice, and newsworthy stories related to basically anything we’d consider part of the “information age”.

Some of the articles you may find interesting are:

• 8 Essential Text Shortcut Websites for Parents
• Energy Drinks and Teens – What Every Parent Ought to Know
• Tracking Your Teen’s Progress in School has Never Been Easier
• A Fundamental Guide to Music Sharing for Today’s Parents

If you are a parent of teens or soon-to-be teens, I’d encourage you to keep up with today’s technology and I believe this site can help!  Stop by often (and tell him I sent you)!

I have already given some pointers about how to stay safe on the ”Wild Wild Web” but today I want to give some tips specifically forkeeping children safe on the Internet.  We know that the Internet is a very huge source of information.  I see it as an unending source of knowledge and to hinder the use or the knowledge of such a tool would be almost crippling.  I know that sounds strong but, if you think about it, almost anything you want to research is on there.  Don’t get me wrong, the library is still a very necessary tool and should not be replaced but supplement.  I am saying the Internet is valuable.

The reason I bring it up is that the fear of the dangers the Internet can move parents to totally cut any connection.  Well, I would like to give some safety tips in order to keep your child safe while utilizing such a tool:

1.  Be Involved!

Be involved in your child’s life!  Create an atmosphere that you child can come to you and talk to you about things that happen and what they learn.  Ask them questions.  Accompany them.  Share with them.  The next point is imperative to doing this:

2.  Learn All You Can

Are you ever faced with the problem of your kids knowing more about computers and the Internet than you do?  This is a very common problem.  It is often difficult to know what your kids may be up to if they know how to keep things out of reach for you.  Well, the bad news is that this may never change.  It’s just the way it is!  I was a teen when the Internet became mainstream (mid-90′s) so I kind of grew up learning about it as it developed, but as fast as the Internet changes, I find it almost impossible to find the time to keep up with EVERYTHING the web has to offer.  Someone a few years older may find it even more difficult because PC’s weren’t really around while growing up.  We need to do our best to keep up with the times.  We need to learn about “Myspace” and “Facebook” and whatever new tech comes out.  We need to learn what sites our kids visit.  A good filtering program can help us with this:

3.  Filter, Filter, Filter

Find a good filtering program and then don’t totally rely on it.  Let me explain the benefits and then explain the dangers of solely relying on it.  A good filtering program will give you the flexibility to block such content as language, nudity, violence, and dangerous sites containing viruses and such.  A good filtering program will also log such things as sites visited, attempts to disable, time spent, etc.  The program I use will even let you designate the hours to allow access to the Internet.  The tools are almost invaluable to keeping your children safe.  My advice would be to be open with your kids about what is being filtered and logged.  Explain to them the importance of accountability in everyone’s life, even adults.  Another good idea would be for each parent to come up with and memorize half of the password.  This way the children will know that the parents are being held accountable AND that any changes to be made are known and approved of by both.  The filtering software I use is K9 Web Protection.  All this being said, you should not rely totally on a software program.  The involvement of parents is imparative.  Besides, sometimes software fails and you want to be involved in case it does.

4.  Limit Time

Another great use for K9 Web Protection is the ability to limit internet use to setup time frames.  You have the control to set specific times the kids are allowed to be online.  As useful as the internet is, moderation is key!  The temptation would be for children to constantly be online.  Well, the temptation does not stop with children, does it?  You can set it so the only time the internet can be accessed is when people are around.  There is a need to limit time spent and software can’t replace the parents but it can HELP.

5.  Social Networking Standards

Social networking is huge right now.  If it’s not big in your home, believe me, it probably is in the homes of the kids’ friends.  Oh, and it’s HUGE in the homes of preditors!  What we have here are two specific ways the social networking sites can be dangerous: your kids’s expression and misbehavior, and an inlet for preditors into the lives of your kids.  I remember reading about a year ago some articles by prominant Christian authors about the dangers of Myspace.  Many of the dangers are real and they are present on other sites too.  What we end up with is minors expressing themselves on their pages in ways they would never dream of in public OR in front of their parents.  Obviously if a child is expressing themself in an undesireable way, there are other issues that need to be dealt with.  However social networking sites become dangerous because such expression ends up in public.  Also, preditors go where they can find victims without supervision and believe me they know about the opportunities that the internet afford!

All of that being said, should you just ban your children from the use of such sites (K9 can do this for you)?  If you as a parent sees this as necessary, by all means, be my guest.  You can definitely save a lot of fuss by going that route.  However, if there is a certain set of standards set up, socail networking sites can be safe.  Most sites have settings that can keep just anyone from seeing your profile, make it so comments are moderated by the user before they are public, friends are agreed apon before being added, etc.  Certain peices of information should not be shared publically:  address, phone number, email address, parents’ names, birthdays, whether parents are home, whether the home is empty, etc.  Most of this may seem obvious but when a stranger is befriending you and you begin to trust him/her, they can begin asking questions to get the info they need.  Parents NEED to be involved in this aspect of the kids’ lives.  Know every friend on their lists!  In fact, be one of the friends on their lists! There should be no secrets here.  The child may not like it but this is too important!  Talk to your kids about social networking standards and then be there to protect them!

6.  Teach Your Children Good Internet Practices.

I won’t go into much detail here but I just did a post about staying safe on the internet; you can refer to that for further help.

7.  Get The Internet Out of the Child’s Bedroom!

Move the computer into a public place in the home, immediately!! In fact I would say the same thing about the television and cable.  Wondering what you child is be exposed to?  Well, make accountability a bit easier by bringing everything into the light.  Less temptation and more information.  They may “hate” you now, but they will love you later!

8.  Rules About Strangers In the Real World Apply On the Internet

Many of the rules that apply to strangers in the real world apply online.  Check out this site for some good safety tips concerning strangers: http://www.itsamomsworld.com/strangersafety.html

9.  Teach Them How Much and What Type of Information is Appropriate To Share

Children need to understand that any information shared online can be used to hurt them.  I already touched this when talking about social networking sites, but it deserves and honorable mention!  Teach them to be vague and to never share personal information.  In fact, teach them what personal information is!

10.  Instill a Healthy Fear

In this case, fear, reverence, and respect for the dangers on the internet is healthy!  Talk to them about the reasons you are so strict with them about the computer and the internet.  Have them put themselves in your shoes as their parent so they can see how you’d feel if anything ever happened to them!  Fear shouldn’t imobilize us motivate us to do what is best.

That is the 10 ways to keep your kids safer online.  It is possible I missed something so if I did, feel free to comment!

I know that sometimes it is scary on the Internet, especially when we hear all of the horror stories about bank accounts being hacked, viruses rendering computers useless, porn popping up out of nowhere, and so on.  Maybe even you have a story of something terrible happening to you or someone you love online.  Well, don’t worry, we’ve all had to deal with the troubles of the untamed web.  I’ve got a few pointers that you may or may not already know but may help you avoid some of that trouble:

1.  Get anti-virus

2.  Get a filter

There are free internet filters out there and I’ve downloaded and tried K-9 Web Protection and I love it!  It has many filtering options including possibly dangerous sites!  For you parents, it has many options to help you monitor the time and the places visited so you can teach your kids accountability and the importance of it.

3.  Keep OS updated

Your operating system may need periodical updates that patch known security holes.  You should definitely keep up with that!

4.  Keep antivirus updated

I mentioned antivirus programs already but I can’t stress enough the importance of keeping them updated!  Most antivirus programs, including the two I have mentioned, make it possible to schedule regular updates and scanning.  Take advantage of this!

5.  Learn to recognize questionable sites

Keep your eyes peeled for sites that may have unnecessary risks involved with visiting them.  One good piece of advice is covered in the next point:

6.  Stay off adult and hacking-related sites

This point should be an obvious one!  Neither of them are run by individuals with your family’s safety at the forefront of their minds!  Sites involved with teaching hacking techniques are ALWAYS at risk for infecting your computer!  If you have K-9 Internet Protection installed and running correctly, it should keep you from stumbling accross one of these anyhow.

7.  Don’t download something that you don’t know much about (do research)

There are many free games and computer programs out there but not all come with some kind of a cost!  Many come with nifty packages of spy-ware and worse!  Make sure you know what you are downloading.  Do some research and see what others are saying about the site and its downloads.  If your pop-ups are going crazy, think about some possible programs or games you’ve recently downloaded and uninstall them to see if the problem is fixed.  Learn how to DO RESEARCH!

8.  Be careful with strangers

I don’t care how friendly they are or how professional the site seems, BE CAREFUL!  Don’t give out any personal information WHATSOEVER in chat rooms, blogs, social networking sites, you name it!  Potential predators OR hackers can use any little peice of information against you!  Check out his site for some more safety tips with strangers: http://www.stayingsafeonline.com/Social%20Networking.htm

9.  Be vague on non-important forms

There are contact forms on many sites and blogs.  There are forms to be filled out for almost any free service offered online.  Be vague with personal information.  I may give the city and state but never my actual address and I usually give the weatherman’s phone number if it’s not important.  I don’t even give my full last name if I don’t think it’s needed.  All of that is on a need-to-know basis!

Many of these points are probably known but sometimes it’s easy to forget.  Many issues we have with our computers and our identity can be avoided with a little forethought.  And yes, sometimes we need to learn from experience, but why if we don’t have to!

Say tuned because soon I will be writing a post more specifically geared toward child safety online!

Anything I may have missed?  Post a comment or two!