How to Become a Mobile Phone Artist

Posted May 28th, 2008 by Kathryn in Mobile Phone Tips

We recently took a look at the proliferation of mobile phone art that is out there in the world today. There are all different sorts of mediums for tackling the mobile phone as an art subject; from mobile phone sculptures to paintings that send a message about the mobile phone in society. But there is also a subsection of the mobile phone art movement which is specifically focused on actually creating art on the mobile phone. Moreover, there are mobile communities through which you can then share this mobile art.

For people who have previously taken an interest in niche art areas like mail art and altered book art, this is the next creative art movement that society is on the cusp of developing. If you’re interested in being part of the trend … continue reading "How to Become a Mobile Phone Artist"

100 Sites With Free Stuff For Your Mobile Phone

Posted May 21st, 2008 by Kathryn in Mobile Phone Tips

Mobile phones are expensive. First you have to buy the phone itself. Then you have to pay for minutes, messages, and data downloads. If you want cell phone accessories and special applications, you have to keep adding up the bill. But not everything out there for your phone has to be expensive. In fact, there are lots of free options out there that let you improve your mobile phone experience without paying anything at all. To get you started, here are one hundred different websites that will give you something for your phone for free.

Free Ring Tones

Perhaps the easiest way to personalize your phone for free is to download free ring tones from the numerous places available online that let you do so. You can choose music that you like, download voice clips from different … continue reading "100 Sites With Free Stuff For Your Mobile Phone"

6 Ways A Mobile Phone Can Make You Smarter

Posted May 13th, 2008 by Kathryn in Mobile Phone Tips

We’ve all looked at some guy jabbering away on his mobile phone and thought to ourselves, “what an idiotâ€. People who speak carelessly on their phones often make those around them privy to their not-so-great ideas and beliefs. And people who behave rudely on their cell phones cause the rest of a crowd to assume that they lack the common sense to engage appropriately with an intelligent society.

However, the cell phone does not have to be a tool which dumbs down your appearance to the world around you. In fact, the mobile phone has many features that can make you seem a whole lot smarter than you really are. By using tools like cell phone audio tours and taking advantage of “phone-a-friend†moments, you can make your phone work for you so that you present yourself to those around you as an intelligent … continue reading "6 Ways A Mobile Phone Can Make You Smarter"

4 Ways A Cell Phone Can Save Your Life!

Posted April 22nd, 2008 by Kathryn in Mobile Phone Tips

The world is a dangerous place. At any moment, you could become the victim of a natural disaster, an international threat or the malicious intentions of the guy next to you on the subway. You could get lost while hiking or find yourself stranded because you forgot to put a spare tire in the trunk of your car. Living in modern society poses certain risks; however, modern society also regularly finds ways to reduce those risks. These days, there’s a good chance that you’re going to have your mobile phone with you during any trouble that you might encounter. Use that fact to your advantage by learning about the ways that your mobile phone can keep you safe from harm.

Emergency calling

The most basic thing that you’ll use your cell phone for in terms of safety is, of course, calling someone for help. This can apply to any situation at all. On the one hand, you might have gone out hiking, lost the trail and now find yourself stranded without food or water. As long as you can get cell phone coverage, you can call for help. Alternatively, you might find yourself in a situation that requires you to get immediate police assistance. If you have your cell phone with you, you can call for that emergency help. In any situation where you may need the assistance of others in order to be safe, a fully charged cell phone with good coverage can be a lifesaver.

Texting for safety

There are two different ways that your cell phone’s SMS message features can keep you safe. The primary method would be through texts that you send out to alert others that you are in danger so that you can solicit some help. However, it’s increasingly possible that you may get cell phone emergency alerts from others that will keep you out of harm’s away.

In terms of sending text messages out, the basic safety features are the same as those that would apply to emergency phone calling. You can let others know that you’re in danger and get the help that you need (whether that’s in the form of police assistance or getting a friend to come out to your stranded car with a new tire) through text messaging. However, with SMS, you also have the added benefit of subtlety. This can be useful when you are in a public place and want to alert someone to the fact that you’re in danger without causing a ruckus in the location. For example, if you found yourself on a creepy date and wanted to make sure that you had a group of friends to escort you away from it without actually drawing attention to the person you were there with, you could text for safety.

Although messaging out is important to your safety, it may be just as important to be able to receive messages. In the United States, the FCC has just approved a new nationwide alert system which sends text messages to your phone in case of certain emergency situations. National disasters and threats will be reported by a nationwide message alert group which will forward the message to phone carriers to be sent via text to your phone. This can help you to make sure that you’re aware of dangers in your area in order to avoid them.

Finding you through GPS

Of course, in most cases you would be all right if you didn’t have your mobile phone. If you were at the restaurant with the creepy date, you could get help from someone there or use the restaurant’s phone to place your call. However, there are times when you may be nowhere near a phone other than your cell phone. And there may be times when you are in such a position that you can’t actually place a call. Perhaps you’ve gotten injured while driving on a lone road and aren’t able to speak because of your injuries.

In most cases, it would be possible for an emergency team to locate you through the navigational GPS tools on your phone. The exact extent to which this can help depends greatly on the area where you are as there have been significant debates about privacy concerns related to cell phone GPS tracking. However, as a general rule, someone would be able to find you through your cell phone even if you couldn’t speak into the phone. In North America, an e911 system is in place which allows emergency responders to pinpoint the location of a cell phone using a reverse cell search.

Camera and blog updates

One of the best things about the mobile phone world today is that it allows you to stay connected to everyone you know – and you don’t even have to call them to stay in touch. More and more people are starting to make use of mobile blogging and mobile social networking tools which let them post short blogs and photo images to their online profile sites from their phones. People who do this regularly may be protecting their general safety because of the fact that a large group of people will be alerted if something might be wrong.

For example, let’s say that you’re typically active on your mobile photo blog on a daily basis. If you don’t post anything for a week, a large base of people is going to be concerned about you. That means that if something has happened to you, you’re going to have people trying to find out what it is. In extreme cases, such as in the case of an abduction, you may be able to post a photo or an announcement of the danger using your phone so that you could get the help that you need.

Or let’s say that you’re arrested in a foreign country and have the ability to use your phone to send a message to your mobile social network. Sound farfetched? That exact thing recently happened when a Berkeley (U.S.) student was arrested at a demonstration in Egypt. He used his phone to send a message to his Twitter network and a lawyer came and bailed him out the next day.

The flipside: dangers of mobile phone use

Unfortunately, every tool that can help you also has the potential to harm you. As a result, you should also be aware that there are risks associated with always having your cell phone with you. Because of the combination of GPS tracking features and regular updates about your location to your mobile social network, people will always know where to find you. Typically, that’s a good thing in terms of your safety. However, it also means that if anyone is interested in harming you, they’ll know where to look to do so.

As with most things in life, the person you’re most likely to do damage to with your mobile phone is yourself. The biggest cause of this is in the area of driving safety. Many parts of the world have laws about driving while on the phone but you should think about your safety even when it’s not illegal to drive and talk. Your phone can be a great tool for keeping you out of harm’s way but you’ll want to always be on the alert and follow rules of common sense in order to keep yourself safe.

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10 Free Features To Personalise Your Mobile Phone

Posted April 17th, 2008 by Kathryn in Mobile Phone Tips

Most of us love our mobile phones (or at least realize how important they are to our daily lives.) Because of this, and because we use them on a daily basis, we’re increasingly interested in personalizing our phones so that they have the design and functionality that we’re seeking. Although there are some people who will spend a fortune to get the phone that has the exact features they desire, most people want to do their mobile phone personalization at a lower cost. And what better cost is there than free?

Take a look at the following ten things that you can easily add to your phone without paying a penny:

1. Ringtones.

Ringtones are by far and away the most popular free item that people add to their cell phones. As time goes on, they’re getting increasingly advanced but the fact that many are free hasn’t changed. You can even get free software that lets you make your own ringtones and add them to your phone so that you can really have a mobile device that’s completely unique.

2. Wallpaper / screen savers.

Ringtones are a great way to personalize your phone but what gets more personal than photos? You can add your own photos or a variety of other images to your phone. These can be associated with the specific people that are calling you or they can just be used as the background wallpaper that you see when using your phone. There are a plethora of different places to get these for free. Free Mobile Fun and Zedge are two examples of popular cell phone wallpaper download sites.

3. Videos.

Video is a hot commodity on the Internet right now and the interest in mobile video is growing by the minute. There are a variety of different ways that you can get free video content on your cell phone. One of the most popular is to subscribe to a free mobile video site that lets you choose your favorite channels and watch free videos directly from your phone. (MyWaves is a good example of this type of service.) However, if you really want a personal video experience then get free cell phone DVD ripper software which will convert your favorite DVDs into a format that can be viewed from your mobile phone. (Acala DVD ripper is a brand name people recognize for this service; it comes with a free trial.)

4. Games.

Videos are certainly great for entertainment on your mobile phone but sometimes they just aren’t interactive enough for you. Free download games have been a popular cell phone feature for almost as long as mobile phones have been on the market. They’re still around because they’re a favorite of most people who own a phone.

5. VoIP.

Who would’ve thought that one of the free phone features you’d be interested in would actually be for the purpose of using your phone to call people? Mobile VoIP is an increasingly popular tool for reducing international calling costs, receiving calls on your cell phone from people trying to reach you at a different number and combining voice, data and image on your cell phone. Learn all about it – and the places that are offering it for free – from this recent report.

6. SMS messages.

Perhaps your phone company provides you with an awesome SMS message plan that meets all of your needs. However, if it doesn’t, there are plenty of free SMS message services that will give you what you want. Many of these let you text from your phone as well as from your PC for added flexibility.

7. Remote desktop control and file storage.

It is increasingly common for people to use their cell phones to access the Internet. Because the mobile phone is beginning to function like a mini-laptop, it needs to have some of the functionality of a computer. As a result, we’re starting to see free mobile phone services that will let you access the files on your home computer either through a direct connection to the computer or through an online file storage system. This is particularly useful for people who use their mobile phones to conduct business but it can be used by anyone who has reason to be on the mobile web.

8. Fax services.

Believe it or not, your phone can receive faxes. There are different systems available but the most common method is that you set up an online fax system that will change the fax content to an email or SMS message and forward it to your phone. There are a lot of professional level services out there which charge you a pretty penny for this feature but there are a few free mobile phone fax services that the basic user can benefit from. Examples of free fax services that will push the fax to email so you can access it from the mobile web include eFax and FaxZero.

9. Music.

Who doesn’t have an mp3 player these days right? Everyone has gotten used to having their favorite music with them wherever they go. However, most people are getting a little tired of carrying around so many different gadgets and are starting to take a strong interest in the mobile phone that plays music. There are tons of free phone music downloads and tools to manage those downloads.

10. Phone management applications.

In order to keep track of all of these features, move them between an old phone and a new one and still manage to remember to pay your bill, you need a tool that will help you stay organized. There are many different free software downloads designed specifically for managing your phone’s tools and making them more useful. Some are specific to the type of phone you have and others are universal.

Your phone is a gadget that says a lot about who you are. Just picture the person with a basic Nokia camera phone that’s a few years old and then picture the individual who is about to buy the latest 3G version of the iPhone and you can see that your phone is sending a message. Make that message more true to who you are by personalizing your phone with all of the features that are important to you. Just don’t spend a lot of money to make the phone personal since there are so many ways that you can do it for free!

Thanks for reading our post! If you like it, you may want to subscribe to our RSS feed. This blog posts regular mobile phone news, reviews and pictures. Go ahead, subscribe to our feed!

10 Rude Things You Really Should Do On Your Mobile Phone

Posted April 14th, 2008 by Kathryn in Mobile Phone Tips

You would think that people would have some common sense when it comes to mobile phone etiquette these days. After all, nearly everybody uses a cell phone now; the novelty has worn off so we don’t have much excuse for our manners to be lacking. But as you probably well know, most people exhibit some pretty rude behavior when they’re talking on their cell phones – whether it’s rude to the person on the phone or rude to the people around them during the call. Before you start pointing fingers at the Chatty Cathy exposing her dirty secrets on the subway in an obnoxiously loud voice, you might want to look in the mirror. Almost all of us are guilty of doing something that violates a basic code of mobile phone niceness.

Here are the top ten rude things that the average mobile phone user is guilty of doing:

1. Putting the person on the other end of the line on hold.

Let’s face it; we often have a good reason to tell the person we’re speaking to that they need to “hold on for a secâ€. After all, when we’re on our mobile phones, we’re often out and about in the world around us. We need to … continue reading "10 Rude Things You Really Should Do On Your Mobile Phone"

12 Steps To Extend The Battery Life Of Your Mobile Phone

Posted March 12th, 2008 by Andrew Boxall in Mobile Phone Tips

Regardless of the fact that the standby time of most modern mobiles runs into days, there has come a point in all our lives where our phone’s battery meter is flashing as we need to make a very important call – will it have the juice to do it, or will it cut out just as you say ‘hello’?  This needn’t be a regular occurrence though, as there several ways to improve the length of time your battery lasts and, because we like you, we’re going to share them.

To work, your mobile phone depends on its battery, in turn making you depend on your mobile phone’s battery, so it makes sense to take look after it.  So before going into detail about … continue reading "12 Steps To Extend The Battery Life Of Your Mobile Phone"