This week on Shelly Palmer Digital Living, Actor/Comedian, Orlando Jones talks with Shelly about digital parenting. John Abell, wired.com’s NY Bureau Chief and Shelly discuss Google’s accusations that Bing is stealing their search results and calling them its own. Shelly’s got some cool websites, great Google tips, important information about backing-up your computer, advice about your Social Media strategy, a everything you need to know about the Verizon iPhone 4.

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Shelly Palmer Digital Living - 02/07/11

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Cool Websites

	Are you tired of constantly worrying about your privacy settings on Facebook, but still want a place to communicate online? Frid.ge allows you to create your own private social networks. After creating an account, you can set up private social networks that are perfect for small private groups. Whether you’re planning a big event or just want to keep your social activity extremely private, Frid.ge gives you all the functionality of a social network and the benefits of real privacy.
	Need to network on the go? GroupMe.com is a great website that lets you send group text messages for free. All you have to do is go to the website and put in your mobile phone number. GroupMe.com supplies you a different private number that allows people you add to send messages to the group. You can even use the number to initiate a group phone conference. Just dial one number and speak with everyone — for free. The best part is, GroupMe.com works on any phone.
	Do you want a quick and easy way to share a file using Twitter? Check out TwileShare.com, a free service that makes it easy to share files on Twitter. You can upload and share anything from images, to documents, and PDFs to e-books. If you have a Twitter account, all you need to do is logon TwileShare.com. Choose a file to upload and share away. You can even download TwileShare files at a later time.

Cyber Security

This week we’re talking about getting control of your data. There are many ways to back up your most sensitive documents and media, so here are some suggestions for making it easier. The first question you must ask yourself is, “What are we backing up?” Are you saving files like word processing docs, pictures, music, movies  AND / OR programs? For most people, the worry is making sure family photos and important text documents are saved. These files are generally small in size and most cloud based storage solutions can handle the task. We’ve included some to the side that will definitely get the job done.

Online Storage Backblaze Carbonite Mozy Zmanda (Open Source) ElephantDrive Dropbox Amazon Jungle Disk

Online & Offline Storage

If you don’t like the idea of having all of your documents online only, both Apple and Microsoft offer solutions that combine cloud storage with disk storage.

	Apple –Time Machine with: Mac me & iDisk
	Windows Backup and Restore with: Windows Azure Cloud Backup

External Storage Suggestions

External storage devices are cheaper than ever, so there’s no reason not to backup. Unless you store many video files, most devices will suffice. Below are a few suggestions:

	Western Digital 1TB External USB Hard Drive Designed with the same commitment to quality that made WD external drives the number one drives in the world, Western Digital’s WD Elements USB 2.0 external hard drives are the right answer for simply affordable add-on storage. Just plug it in to a USB port and start saving your photos, music, video, and files. Kit contains; USB 2.0 external hard drive, USB cable, AC adapter, Quick Install Guide.
	Seagate 1TB External USB Hard Drive Seagate Expansion external portable drives are compact and perfect for on-the-go. Instantly add more storage space to your computer and take large files with you when you travel. Set-up is straight forward, simply connect a single USB cable and you are ready to go. The drive is powered from the USB cable, so there is no need for an external power supply.
	Sandisk 32GB USB Flash Drive Sometimes you just need to take a few files from one computer to another. If you’re taking family photos to put on Grandma’s computer or frequently take presentations with you, this Sandisk jump drive will get the job done.

If you are backing up video and larger files regularly, a RAID storage setup is worth the money.

Glyph 4TB Raid Hard Drive RAID — Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks – a little more money, but Glyph makes my favorite external drives. http://www.glyphtech.com/products/ Dual HDD backup and production enclosures.  Way more money, but way safer and worth every penny!

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Featured Gadget

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iPhone 4 and Verizon – should you get one or not?
Everyone is asking this question lately and if you’re trying to decide whether or not to switch to the Verizon iPhone, the below article lays out the facts to help you decide:

Verizon iPhone 4	“Should I get a Verizon iPhone 4?” is the number one question I’ve been asked this week in person, via email, on the web, via smoke signals and by carrier pigeon. The short answer is, no. The long answer is, if you love your existing iPhone 4 but really, really hate AT&T, then yes — but otherwise, no. Here’s why: Read More

Overcoming the Digital Divide

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Computer, tablet, or e-reader?

If you’re not sure whether you’re in the market for a computer, tablet or e-reader, this clip from my Fox 5 Hi-Tech Holiday Gift Guide can help you weigh out the options.

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