Don’t get me wrong, I like Apple – kinda. Last December, I invested in a MacBook Pro – which I’m still trying to learn how to use. It’s not as easy to ‘Switch to Mac’ as they’d have you believe. Still lovin’ my iPod, though.

The iPhone glitch (and before it, the Palm Pre glitch) have proven to validate a relatively new mantra of mine, which I adopted earlier this year and continue to implement. I’ve declared 2010 the year of “Simplify”. Yep, that’s it. I’m trying to incorporate “Simplify” into everything I do, with varying levels of success (so far).

As it applies to mobile phones, I’ve committed Geek Heresy, getting rid of my Smart Phone and embracing my Dumb Phone.

Here’s why. Since Smart Phones came into existence, I’ve owned all manner of the beast. I loved that they’d allow me to do all kinds of cool things, like synchronize the contacts, appointments and some documents from my computer. I also liked the applications or ‘apps’ as they’re called now, the games, and so on. In the early days, the apps weren’t as plentiful, but they added functionality to a device you could carry around with you.

Looking back, I rationalized the need for the latest and greatest smart phones as being critical for work, and if I’m to be honest – they were more of a novelty than a necessity. Still, it was nice to have a GPS I could carry on my belt. Unfortunately, the closer they come to being a replacement for a laptop, the less functional they’ve become as a phone – the original reason we lug them around!

Additionally, I found myself increasingly frustrated with the apps themselves. While I could do a lot of the same things on my smart phone as I could on my laptop, many times the functionality was limited by the processing power of the device, or by the data connection. So the smart phone could barely do the job of the laptop it was aiming to replace, and it was getting worse at the primary function of being a phone!

I just needed a phone to be a phone.

When I swore off the Smart Phone, I looked for a replacement, initially thinking one of the old style candy bar shaped phones that have served me well in the past. I was introduced to Straight Talk Wireless, which offers a number of dumb phones. I then thought, “What about a camera?” – so, not being able to survive without one – even if I can count the pixels on one hand – I opted for a classic Motorola Razr. It’s a flip style phone with a camera, and not much else. Perfect. And while it doesn’t have all the bells and whistles, I am able to do much of what I did before via web applications like Utterli or Ping.fm that I can call or text from my dumb phone.

Now, not only do I have NO overpriced contract, my monthly phone bill is about $35, less than many carrier’s data plan, and much less than my old Smart Phone bill.

I just hope they don’t revoke my Geek membership.

Well….. they say they do. But let’s think for a moment. If you’re hosting your website with one of these “el-cheapo” outfits that promises you the moon for only four dollars a month and whose support center is located somewhere between Calcutta and Tibet – how much time do you think they’ll invest in server backups or data recovery?I’ll relate my own rather painful and personal experience. As a Web Designer, I contracted with an Alabama firm for hosting, along with the requisite service package. Imagine my horror when about 60% of my websites disappeared inexplicably! During a scheduled electrical upgrade to the data facility, there was an unplanned power outage. Upon reboot, it was discovered that some equipment was damaged – as well as the backups. I immediately moved several affected websites to a new host, restoring them from my own backups, but a few more had to be completely rebuilt from scratch. How embarrassing. Realizing I could no more depend on a hosting company to recover my data than I could the weatherman to forecast Sunny and 74 degrees this weekend, I set out to create an effective and affordable “backup” back-up plan.

Here’s what I do.

Start with a good hosting firm
Backup Your Website Locally
Do It Again – On a Pocket Hard Drive or USB Key
Do It Again – In the Cloud

Okay, you could probably get away with doing it on a hard drive OR the cloud, but I do them both I’ll never again worry about restoring a website!

Start with a good hosting firm.

There are several good hosts, but in my opinion, Rackspace is the gold standard, and it comes with a matching price tag. To make it even better, I utilize their “Cloud” service – so my websites exist on several servers in multiple data centers, so even when an issue develops, the affected machine’s data is quickly replaced by the replicated data on another server. Kinda like the Borg, for you Trekkies. While not completely infallible, website downtime is minimized.

Backup Your Website Locally

If you publish your website to the web with software like Dreamweaver or Expression Web, you likely have a “backup” copy locally already, it’s the one you edit on your computer. If you publish your website utilizing an online service, it may have a backup utility that will compress your website for download. If so, just download the backup file to your computer.

If you don’t have these options, your host should offer FTP access which will allow you to download your website.

I automate the backup process for all of my sites with software. You might try SiteVault, a program that once set up, will automagically back up your website on a schedule that you determine. In the event of a website loss, (or if you just want to restore a previous version) you can restore the entire website with a few clicks. It even works on database-driven websites.

Do It Again – On a Pocket Hard Drive or USB Key

So, what happens if you website goes down – AND your computer is hosed? Many victims of the recent flooding lost everything – including their data. If your website is backed up on a USB key or Pocket Hard Drive, no worries. Store it away from your computer in the event of a disaster.

Do It Again – In the Cloud

Well, this might be a bit redundant – but that’s the name of the game, right? Utilizing an affordable online backup/storage service like SugarSync or JungleDisk, you can access your backed-up website from any internet-connected computer.

Of course, in order to be effective, you must actually do the backups. This means establishing a routine – I’d advise doing it weekly at a minimum. It’ll be worth the investment of time should you ever experience a website loss. Of course, MY clients don’t have to worry about this. Wink, Wink.

Google Chrome OS is an open source, lightweight operating system that will initially be targeted at netbooks.

Netbooks have been the best-selling segment of the PC market during the recession — because they’re cheaper.  Contrary to perceptions that everyone is buying them because they’re highly mobile, a recent consumer survey found that 60% of buyers never took them out of the house.

Google is trying to create an OS built around “Software as a Service” that replaces applications a user might run on their own computer with applications that run on ‘cloud’ servers.

Here’s the latest from Google, released in an official blog post dated 11/19/2009:

Today we are open-sourcing the project as Chromium OS. We are doing this early, a year before Google Chrome OS will be ready for users, because we are eager to engage with partners, the open source community and developers.

Although they’re releasing it to the open-source community, it won’t be available to consumers until this time next year.

First, it’s all about the web. All apps are web apps. The entire experience takes place within the browser and there are no conventional desktop applications. This means users do not have to deal with installing, managing and updating programs.

Second, because all apps live within the browser, there are significant benefits to security. Unlike traditional operating systems, Chrome OS doesn’t trust the applications you run. Each app is contained within a security sandbox making it harder for malware and viruses to infect your computer.

If the system detects something peculiar, it will restore the affected areas from the cloud.

Most of all, we are obsessed with speed. We are taking out every unnecessary process, optimizing many operations and running everything possible in parallel. This means you can go from turning on the computer to surfing the web in a few seconds.

Chrome OS will not support slower traditional hard drives.  Instead, it will only feature smaller, faster, solid-state drives (SSD ) and rely on the cloud to store documents and photos, meaning you can forget about keeping your giant music collection on one of these babies.

Chrome OS could be the ultimate OS when it arrives – but will Google also pull 50,000+ applications out of thin air to make it a comparable tool to Windows? No matter how great it is, it’s only as good as the software it utilizes.  As an incentive to developers – because it’s based on a Web browser, every app developed for Chrome will also run perfectly on Windows or the Mac.

It begs the question – Are browsers and web applications mature enough to replace traditional software?

About the Author:

Ken Ivey, aka “the Web Czar” – wants to help you leverage technology to reach your goals.  Contact Ken for a free initial consultation to see how the web can work for you.  His website is www.kenivey.com

You don’t have to be internet or computer savvy to utilize this alternate way of enjoying your favorite television shows right from your home computer or laptop. The sites and software are plentiful and the benefits are many. Naturally there are also drawbacks, but first let’s focus on why this new age way of television watching is stealing customers of cable and satellite across the globe.

Benefits of Watching TV Online
Why would anyone want to watch television on a computer screen instead of on their TV? Here are a few reasons:

• Save money – keeping some extra cash in the pocket has motivated many a cable/satellite customer to switch to watching TV online.  Websites that offer television viewing are often completely free or ask for a low monthly or annual membership payment. No cable or satellite company can come up with a special to beat these savings!
• No commercials – well, almost. You may have to watch a message from a sponsor, but they are far shorter than commercials and some sites only have them at the beginning of the video, while others have a sponsor’s message in particular increments during the show.
• Convenient – when you get home from work, the latest episode of your favorite series is right there waiting for you. Whenever you’ve got the time, you can enjoy your favorite shows – and pause and rewind them.
• Selection – Aside from watching the latest shows on television online, you can find many shows that are no longer broadcasted on TV channels.

Drawbacks of Watching TV Online

Like all good things, watching television online has it downfalls. After hearing its benefits you may be wondering what’s not to love about making the switch, here’s what:

• Quality – high speed internet and a computer in perfect working condition are essential when viewing TV shows online, but even the best internet connection can have problems with slow or choppy playing of shows.
• Waiting Period – you may have to wait a few days to watch your favorite show’s latest episodes, until they become available online.

So there you have it, the good and the bad of internet television watching. If you think you would enjoy and benefit from this modern method of entertainment, here are some places to start watching your favorite shows (old and new) today!

• Hulu.com
• Netflix.com
• Fancast.com
• Comcast.com (ironic, isn’t it?)
• ABC.com
• Fox.com
• CWTV.com
• CBS.com
• Lifetime.com
• MTV.com
• History.com
• Youtube.com
• iTunes
• ChannelChooser.com

Today, every network has a website and you can usually watch that network’s regular shows whenever you want via their site. You can check your local tech stores for more information on software that will turn your PC into a TV for you and your friends to enjoy anytime!

About the Author:

Ken Ivey, aka “the Web Czar” – wants to help you leverage technology to reach your goals.  Contact Ken for a free initial consultation to see how the web can work for you.  His website is www.kenivey.com