DemoGirl

A couple of months ago, some friends and I were looking to have a nice dinner, some drinks, and good conversation, but we couldn’t find anything open.  The problem was that it was the middle of the week and it was after 10pm, and a lot of places in San Francisco aren’t open all that late during the week.  I don’t know why, but that seems to be the case.  Well, we ended up at a restaurant/wine bar that had nice ambiance, but the food left something to be desired.  We had no choice in the matter, though.  We just couldn’t find anything else that was open.  This brings me to GeoSpot – a service that allows you to do a deep search so you can not only search for where to eat, but where to eat NOW.

It’s a very basic concept, actually, and you can use it at home or on your mobile phone.  You enter in what you’re looking for (ie. pizza, cookies, martini), where you want to eat/drink it, and what time you want to do it (ie. now, 6am, after 10pm).  GeoSpot will give you a list of results that are only able to service you at the time you’re requesting.  You can even search for related results, view business information, and get directions.  Now, this may seem like a novelty if you’re at home and you have the time to search for a specific restaurant and see what time they serve until.  But, if you’re out and about and need a giant burrito to soak up the 15 tequila shots you just did, then GeoSpot on your mobile phone may save you a nasty hangover in the morning.  Just be warned that the GeoSpot blog says it’s really focused on the San Francisco Bay area for now.  I didn’t know that until just posting this. Here’s my screencast tour of GeoSpot:

Click Here To Watch The Screencast 2m2s

Want this screencast on your site?  Click here to get the code for this and other DemoGirl screencasts!

[via CenterNetworks]

Here we are again my lovely DemoGirl readers. It’s Friday and you’re ready to punch that time card and head out for the weekend. I know that attention spans can be minimized in the afternoon on one of the greatest days of the week, so I’ve decided to profile three applications in just three minutes that may help you out this weekend. One to help you keep track of new episodes of your favorite TV shows, one that may help you find a great deal while shopping online, and one to help you find your lost cell phone.

MyTvRSS allows you to create an RSS feed that will update you every time one of your favorite TV shows has a new episode. All you need to do is select the shows you like, and MyTvRSS will create the feed that you can add to your reader of choice. This is especially useful for people like me who never turn on the TV, but probably would if they knew a that a new episode of House was going to be on.

PriceAdvance is a Firefox Extension and Internet Explorer plugin that gives you instant price comparisons of items you’re shopping for. It doesn’t necessarily only give you better prices, it just lets you see what everyone else is charging for something you’re thinking about purchasing. The affiliate merchant sites are somewhat limited so you may not see results if you’re looking for something like sneakers or a set of white wall tires, but if you’re looking for electronics or DVDs, I’d definitely give PriceAdvance a try.

PhoneMyPhone needs minimal explanation – it will ring your phone for you at any time you tell it to. There’s no voicemail task reminder service, no free text messaging, and it won’t tell you how to get anywhere. It will, however, help to get you out of a boring meeting, help you to flee an excruciating blind date, or ring your phone if you’ve lost it somewhere. Done, done, and done.

Here’s my Friday Quickcast Special:

Click Here To Watch The Screencast 3m

Want this screencast on your site?  Click here to get the code for this and other DemoGirl screencasts!

[via downloadsquad, CenterNetworks, and MakeUseOf]

Wakerupper is a free wake-up call service that also doubles as a reminder service. You can try it out from the homepage without signing up for anything by entering in your call details. If you sign up for an account you can add multiple phones to receive calls on, keep track of your calls, and set up ongoing calls. You can also record audio and Wakerupper will call you and play your message whenever you need it. It’s extremely straightforward and easy to use — no fancy features to get in the way of what the service is supposed to be used for.

One thing I was surprised about when trying it out, was that there’s no initial phone number verification call so I could schedule a call to anyones phone as long as I know their number. I do like the fact that I don’t have to worry about receiving and replying to annoying verification text messages, but I wonder if it would actually be useful to avoid wake-up call spam. There is an option at the end of the call to let Wakerupper know if you didn’t schedule the call, so that could be how they’re planning on policing the service. Here’s my screencast tour of Wakerupper:

Click Here To Watch The Screencast 3m32s

Want this screencast on your site? Click here to get the code for this and other DemoGirl screencasts!

[via AppScout]

Brightkite allows you to share where you are, at any given moment, through the Web or SMS.  Like Twitter, you can also post a note sharing what you’re currently doing.  Unlike Twitter, your friends will be able to see where you are when you’re doing these very important things.  Besides just posting your location and notes, you can also post photos, see other Brightkite users around you, and you can update to Twitter at the same time.  All of this can be done from the Web or from your mobile phone.  You can customize your privacy settings so you’ll only receive posts and “check ins” (where you are) from your friends or, more importantly, trusted friends.  Trusted friends is a feature I think Twitter should add because it allows you to let certain people see certain information.  For example, if I wanted to only let my close friends know where I was going to get drinks after work without having to send them all a direct message.  All around, I’m really loving Brightkite.

I will say that while Brightkite is nice to look at, it’s a little cluttered for my taste right now.  There is a lot going on and it’s going on all over the place.  Also, giving people a way to “check in” to a location right from the main page would be nice. As it is, you need to either go to your saved locations and select check in or search for a location and then check in.  Since a main focus of the site is checking in, I think that button should be more prominent.  Giving people a way to check out of a location would be nice as well (what if they leave a bar and don’t want to check in when they get to the next one?).  It is in private beta so I’m more than willing to see where Brightkite goes.  Here’s my screencast tour of Brightkite:

Click Here To Watch The Screencast 5m8s

Want this screencast on your site?  Click here to get the code for this and other DemoGirl screencasts!

Last weekend I went to a great dinner with a bunch of fancy pants.  When the bill came (I didn’t realize we’d ordered the platinum cheese plate) some credit cards were thrown down for credit card roulette.  What this means is that the owner of the card that the server picks out of the pile, has to pay the entire bill.  I did not throw my credit card in because, frankly, I didn’t even have enough money in my account to cover the bill.  Out of 12 people, only 5 put in their cards.  What I later learned, is that if you didn’t put your card in, you need to give the loser your share of the bill.  Seems reasonable, right?  Wrong.  I still owe the poor guy 40 bucks and I don’t know if he ever got money from the rest of the people who didn’t put their card in.  Enter Buxfer:

Buxfer helps you track your money and keep track of who owes you what.  You can sync it with your credit card and bank accounts so you can see exactly where your money is being spent.  It allows you to send and receive payments using Amazon Payments so your friends can’t use the excuse that “they don’t have the cash on them right now”.  The most useful part of Buxfer is that you can do all this from the Web, SMS, Twitter, and your iPhone.

So, to my friend who got screwed at dinner last weekend, these screencasts of how to use Buxfer on the Web and with the iPhone, are for you:

Buxfer for the iPhone

Buxfer on the Web

While talking to my Mom the other day, the subject of text messaging came up. She said that she doesn’t understand why anyone would send a text message over making an actual call. I tried to explain to her that sometimes you just don’t want to talk to the person – you just want to relay a quick piece of information without getting caught up in all the chit chat that comes along with making a phone call. She said, “Oh, Ok” but I know she still thinks it’s a dumb idea. I completely disagree. The thing is, that sending a text message is still sort of an interruption and you usually feel some sort of response is necessary. Even if you just text back, “Ok, thanks”, you still have to involve yourself in the conversation somehow. This is why SlyDial is so sneakily cool.

SlyDial allows you to call a person and leave them a voice mail, without their knowledge. All you need to do is call the SlyDial number and when prompted, enter in your friends number. You’ll hear a quick advertisement and then you’ll be connected to your friends voice mail, all without their phone ever ringing. I tried it out a few minutes ago on my friend who lives in Hawaii and it appears to have worked. You could use SlyDial to call in sick to work and not worry about talking to your boss, to cancel plans with a friend you don’t really like, or to leave a birthday message for a relative you hate conversing with. The possibilities are endless. SlyDial is in private beta right now but you can sign up here to try to get early access.

[via Webware]

Recently, I’ve started listening to NPR on my laptop when I go to sleep at night and when I wake up in the morning.  I’ve always needed some sort of background noise in order to sleep and having the TV on is just too distracting.  NPR is great, but I think Stitcher is going to be my new morning online radio.

Stitcher allows you to listen to stories from popular blogs and Websites such as TechCruch, VentureBeat, The Onion Radio, The Weather Channel, and much more.  When you first log into Stitcher, you’ll see stations that you can choose from (ie: sports, comedy, Silicon Valley Professional) and within those stations are various streams of audio from specific sites.  You can create a favorites list of all your favorite content so all you need to do is press play.  Over time, Stitcher will learn what you like and suggest stations to you.  Of course, the best part of Stitcher for most of you out there is that you can listen to it on your iPhone which could make your morning commute a little more enjoyable.  Stitcher is currently in private beta but if I get my hands on any invites, I’ll pass them on.

[via Mashable]

So, as of a couple of days ago, my phone is not receiving text messages.  I know, I know, call my service provider and sort it out.  Well, it’s really not all that important to me at the moment and I really don’t feel like talking to those guys right now.  I did, however, do a Google search for a Web based solution.  What I found was Joopz.

Joopz allows you to send and receive text messages right from the Web.  You can create a contact list to be stored with all of your friends numbers and create groups for sending out mass text messages.  I tried it out on my friend Michelle and it worked like a charm.  I just entered in her number, entered my message into the text box, and pressed send.  About a minute later I got her usual hello, I responded, and so on – all from my Joopz account.  The third message from her ended up being “who is this?” because I didn’t come up as “Molly” on her phone.  My phone number was shown as the sender and I don’t think she knows my number.  I actually don’t think it’s that uncommon for people to not know their friends actual numbers nowadays, so a nice feature addition could be to allow you to add a name instead of your phone number.  Joopz is free to use for 10 outgoing messages a month and unlimited incoming messages.  It’s just $2.95 a month or $19.95 a year for unlimited messaging and a complete message history.  One big reason I chose to test out Joopz is because even though it’s meant for text messaging, it doesn’t require any sort of text message activation, which I obviously can’t do since that’s the problem I’m having right now.  Here’s my screencast tour of Joopz:

Click Here To Watch The Screencast 3m22s

Want this screencast on your site?  Click here to get the code for this and other DemoGirl screencasts!

Friends and family who know me are well aware of my “little problem” when it comes to driving directions. Basically, my sense of direction is so bad that I get lost any time I turn off of my street. This fact was proven once again a couple of weeks ago when I was driving home from an event and was so turned around that I could have been in Texas and not known the difference. It was late at night and I started to panic after about 45 minutes of driving around – absolutely nothing looked familiar. I’m not big on stopping and asking for directions (especially in the neighborhood I was in) because it makes me feel like an idiot, which probably makes me an even bigger idiot. Finally I called a friend of mine and I told him the intersection I was at and he Google Mapped me home. What if no one was home though? What would I have done? I would probably still be driving in circles.

Today, all of my fears of getting lost in the ghetto again have been laid to rest thanks to the “get me the heck outta here!” service from Dial Directions. All you need to do is dial the letters DIR-ECT-IONS on your cell phone and tell the nice lady on the other end where you want to go and your current location. A text message arrives almost instantly with directions from MapQuest. You can also specify major chain stores and be given directions to the one closest to your location. You can even create directions to an event on Dial Directions and then tell your friends to call the number and say the name of the event. They’ll be given directions from where they are to the location you plugged into the Dial Directions website. Normally I only post screencasts on DemoGirl but in this case I thought I’d share this demo video they put together so you can see just how cool this service is. Just so ya know, I did try it out and it worked great.

Phonevite is a free service that allows you to send invitations and announcements to your friends, family, and co-workers over the phone. All you need to do is sign up for an account, quickly verify your number which is used as your caller ID, add your recipients numbers, and record your message over the phone or by using a headset or microphone. You choose the date and time the call is made and you can request to receive an RSVP as well. Your calls are all stored in your account and all of the replies from your guests are organized for you – so you can quickly see who’s attending.

I was recently contacted by the guys over at Phonevite to create a custom screencast for their service. I tested it out last week and I have to say, I think it’s a pretty cool service. (John and Kalvin are also really nice guys!) If you want to see Phonevite in action and see some of what I do when I’m not posting to my blog, check out the screencast I made for Phonevite here.

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