NowITWorks.net

Facebook has introduced a new feature that allows users to use the GPS on their phone to let their friends know where they are. Facebook Places is the new app, available for smart-phones that works similar to FourSquare. The user can use this app to meet up with friends or find out if they are in the area.

While social media can be useful to stay in touch with friends & family, would you want everyone to know where you are, at all times?

It’s going to make avoiding annoying friends and ditching family picnics a whole lot tougher!

Our help desk received a call one morning  from a prospective customer who was in a panic. He had just sent out a very important email from his phone, to a client and received a bounce-back notice that the email had not been delivered. When he got to the office, he learned that no one had access to Outlook so he called Now IT Works. 

As it turns out:

As a Now IT Works client, your servers are being monitored on many levels:

In a telling sign of the swine-flu times, iPhone has released an application that will let a user know if there are disease-outbreaks lurking in their neighborhood.

Named “Outbreaks Near Me” – the app is designed to alert users of disease information. The mobile version even allows participation; for example, if a clinic is noticing a high number of similar cases or something unusual, they can submit that information to the system via this app.

The creators, Clark Freifeld and his HealthMap partner, John Brownstein aren’t sure exactly what will happen with this app but figure it’s best to “just put it out there” and let the users decide.

For more information – read the complete article at Wired.com

That’s right – back to school is right around the corner and PC World has released a “Back to School Gift Guide” – sure to be a hit with students of all ages!

Check it out at PC World – Back to School Gift Guide

Twitter has confirmed that they will start charging businesses to use their services in an effort to collect revenue for their currently-free social networking site.

Paid accounts will also offer access to statistics and analytics that are not currently available through the regular Twitter service.

For more information on this topic – click to read “Twitter to Charge Businesses to Tweet” on Silicon.com

Last week, we had a customer inquire about an e-fax system, which is an online faxing service that processes faxes online and converts them into  email messages. In this case, it would allow all six of their offices to direct faxes to one main online location, but still be separated by office. With the large amount of faxing, both in and out, each day, this solution makes perfect sense.

Some advantages to online faxing include; an end to paper jams, and buying ink, no bulky machine and the ability to fax from just about anywhere.

E-faxing not only increases the speed and ease of faxing but it’s better for the environment than traditional faxing practices!

Do you think an e-fax solution would work for your company? Email info@nowitworks.com for more information on this and other money saving products for your business.

The Cybraphon is a creation by three friends, that plays musical tones and harmonies based on, sadly enough, how much online approval it is garnering. When online attention is high, the Cybraphon lets out a beautiful melody but when the internet audience dwindles, the Cybraphon gets sad – and sounds like it too.

To read more about this interesting invention and how the creators say it’s an exercise in “people’s obsession with online celebrity” – click here.  (Source: CNN)

You can friend the Cybraphon on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Cybraphon

PC World has an interesting article by David Coursey about how Google continues to thrive despite putting out unfinished products but people aren’t complaining – because it’s free.

Although, with the release of the new Chrome OS which requires the purchase of the actual computer – Google now faces a pressure to perform, according to Coursey.

You can check out the rest of the article by clicking on this link: “Google: The World’s Most Successful Failure?“

Firefox users have been waiting for this one!  Mozilla has announced that June 30th will see the release of the newest version of their popular browser, complete with a whole mess of new features, including HTML5 support, private browsing (which Google’s Chrome has sported for some time now), and a brand new JavaScript engine.  Head on over to Mozilla’s Firefox 3.5 page to see some more details, or take a look at their release video:

(Main image courtesy of Mozilla)

Microsoft has finally announced the name of their new search engine – Bing. Read about why Lance Ulanoff (Editor-in-Chief at PC Mag) thinks it’s good…but probably not going to scare Google any time in the foreseeable future, as the search engine to beat.

Source: PC Mag – full article here