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Seembee – Personal Document Management
Access to information anywhere, anytime is vital in business. We all know that keeping paper documents is cumbersome and difficult to file and retrieve. The solution is electronic archival and retrieval systems. These systems can be used to store huge amount of information at a relatively low cost and the data can be saved virtually at any place around the world. The problem is people still rely on paper most of the time. So the question about how to easily convert these to electronic format.
Take an example where you need to file some documents relatively quickly and on the move like a store receipt. Seembe is an iPhone application which provides you with the ability to take snapshots of a document, give it a title, assign tags for easy searching and add notes to it for recollection. This document can then be uploaded to your account for access at the office or home at a later time.
The application is free and the subscription charges are nominal. This application is an example where an occasional document needs to be filed electronically. For bulk volume, you have to look elsewhere.
What they say about themselves
We are offering an online personal archiving system, accessible anytime and anywhere. The smartphone is used as a front-end, for acquiring data and for quick viewing. The web environment provides extended capabilities for processing and manipulating the stored data. Fast, efficient and user friendly.
Why it could be a success
The facility to store any document electronically from a picture to a menu card or a classroom note, Seembee provides an easy to use interface packed with some powerful features. Its a pity that the application is targeted only for iPhone, and can use an expansion to other platforms as well.
LaptopFriendlyCafes
Cafes with free wifi along with your cup of coffee are listed on laptopfriendlycafes.com. There is already a good selection as I found out by typing in my local area of London, and it’s also international with wifi hotspot cafés around the world. If your favourite wifi cafes aren’t listed you can submit them and also give your review of the venues.
The designers say they started the site after compiling information for their own use when out and about with their laptops looking for wifi connections, and like many good sites it has been built from the real and practical needs of its designers. Cafes are easily found using Search, and you can also use the information on your iPhone. The other main options on the toolbar are quick submission of a café, and an option to have your café features and promoted prominently on the main pages.
The iPhone application is interactive and automatically finds the nearest wifi café depending on your location. By tapping it you can get the location on a Google map and you can also see all the other cafes in the surrounding area. It also lets you browse by café or location name. The iPhone application is for New York, London, Melbourne and Sydney. The laptop application has a greater variety of cities and is growing all the time.
Blabbelon – High Quality Voice Communication Online
The moment I saw a description of Blabbelon I could see it was a service I’ve been looking for, so it should prove useful to others. Blabbelon allows users to talk to others, either individually or as a group, no matter what they’re doing on the internet at that time. They might be involved in a virtual world game or conducting professional business, or perhaps using the internet for a distance learning course and workshop.
Isn’t that just like Skype, you might ask. Well, in a lot of ways it is, but one major difference is that you don’t have to download software and adjust the settings to get it started. With Blabbelon you could quickly direct people to the website where they can log in with their email address to receive a password, and you can start the communication almost immediately.
Once you’ve registered you can invite your contacts by email to join Blabbelon and add them to any ‘Blabs’ you want to set up. Afterwards you can also add contacts using their Blabbelon name. To talk to them you use a hot key, the default is the right Control key but you can change it, or you click on a Talk button with your mouse. Discussion can continue while you browse other websites or carry on with your game, and if you don’t want to join in by talking you can also use text. One of the main difficulties with voice communication online is that everybody talks at once, or two people talk over each other. With Blabbelon you can only talk while you hold the button, and as you release it another person takes a turn.
Although I couldn’t test it, as I need to add contacts first, I can see it will prove useful to me based on the website statements. Apart from the ease of getting started, which I really need when I suddenly want to have a group discussion for distance learning workshops, I would value the push-button approach to stop people talking at the same time. Blabbelon also promises high quality sound, which would be invaluable when I need to film a meeting or performance. The high-definition sound quality uses technology called Silk created by Skype. The website describes SILK as a ‘super wideband audio codec that delivers optimized voice clarity while minimizing internet bandwidth needs.’ While people like me would use this for a small group, it could also be used for hundreds or even thousands simultaneously, according to Blabbelon. Future plans include Blabbelon for the iphone and other mobile/cellphones.
Socially!