Blog from your phone, call for free or use your computer to make free phone calls. Google Voice isn’t the easiest Google service to explain to non-techies, partially because it can be used for so many different things. Find a short list of those things below.

Using only a phone to manage voicemail is old fashioned: Google Voice does a much better job. Manage your voicemail on your computer or phone, and enjoy unlimited free texting within the US and Canada. It’s a service no human should be without, but which is sadly (still) limited to humans who reside in the United States of America. Google, remedy this!

Find below just a few advanced Google Voice tricks. Know some more? Leave them in the comments below the article and share them with the world.

Blog From Your Phone

Imagine being able to blog by phone, from anywhere. It’s not farfetched: our very own Ryan devised a method of voice blogging. It’s not perfect, but it’s a great way to get in a quick blog post from the road.

Free Calls and Texts To Canada

Cell phone has no concept of long distance, provided I’m calling or texting a US number. It’s another matter when you call or text Canada: that costs extra. Good thing I have Google Voice: it allows you to call or text Canada for free.

You can do this one of two ways. The first is to call Google Voice number from my cell phone, then call Canada from that. It’s easy, but requires some extra dialing.

The second way requires some setup, but works very well: have your Canadian friend send a text message to your Google Voice number. Assuming you’ve set up Google Voice to forward texts to your phone, you will now have an American number you can use to reach your Canadian friend. Save this new number and you can call your friend as though it were a domestic call, anytime.

Free Calls From Your Browser

This isn’t exactly a secret, but many people don’t seem to realize it: you can make free phone calls from within Gmail, provided you’re calling a number inside the US or Canada.

Even cooler: if your Google Voice number is your primary phone number, you can pick up your phone calls in Gmail. You just need to turn on chat and install the Google video chat browser extension.

Another related but also lesser-known trick: you can add any phone number to a Google Plus Hangout, allowing you to include people without Internet access in your conversations.

Combine Google Voice and Skype

Skype is a very affordable way to make long distance phone calls, but there is one problem with it: unless you set up a call display number you appear as ‘unknown caller’ on the phone of the person you’re trying to reach. Many people will, assuming you’re a scam artist, and refuse to pick up.

You can buy a phone number from Skype to avoid this. Or, if you don’t want to spend money on a subscription, you can set up your Skype account to display your Google Voice number for call display. That way people you call will see a real phone number.

You might consider doing this even if you’ve paid Skype for an incoming number: people will call you back at your Google Voice number instead of your Skype number, meaning you’ll get the call on all of your phones instead of just Skype.

Add a Voicemail Feature To Your Blog

Want to hear from the people who read your blog? Add a voicemail button to it. This allows people to leave you a voicemail without telling the world your phone number. People who visit your site can enter their phone number and, in one click, connect their phone to your voicemail inbox.

Read the full instructions for setting up a voicemail feature on your blog here.

Other Cool Tricks

Of course, there are many more cool things you can do with Google Voice. Ryan outlined several of them in 2010, and his tricks still work very well. They are:

• Integrating Google Voice for all mobile calls
• Listening in to your voicemail in real time
• Automatic transcriptions of all voicemails
• Recording phone calls
• Custom greetings for different groups of people

(Via MakeUseOf.com.)

I believe in the power of the internet to support communities, share information and learn about the universe.  I submit Instructables, post how-to videos and mentor students around the globe.  I use open source and creative commons just as much as I add to it.

Yet Pinterest makes me uncomfortable.  This social media service assumes that any visual content is there for the taking.  Their ‘pin it’ button seamlessly integrates copyrighted material into the Pinterest licensing system. It’s just a little too slick not to wonder what’s happening behind their closed doors.

I am not going to delve into the legality of Pinterest TOS nor how many users are pinning content without copyright approval.  That will be played out over time by those far more qualified than myself.

What I want to share with you is the understanding that Pinterest is a tool.  And just like any other tool you need to use it wisely to support your needs or it will use you.  The following is a heirarchy of methods I employ when sharing information on the internet and specifically addresses the optimization of Pinterest.

Now here is a fun idea to add a bit of hammer horror to your guitar collection, Grip Studios create monster hand guitar hangers in a number of finishes including carved wood.

They’re strong and durable and will support many times the weight of any guitar or bass. You can rest assured your axe is in good ‘hands’. – teh lolz…

Our hangers are machined and balanced so your instrument fits securely. The grip is equipped with a rubber cushion so the neck and head stock of your guitar or bass is well protected. Won’t harm nitrocellulose finishes. We at Grip Studios believe strongly in our products and most importantly in the satisfaction of ourcustomers. Bottom line… we stand behind our work. Each piece comes with our 30 day Money Back Guarantee and a Life-time Warranty against defects in craftsmanship.

The Standard model is the GS-1 which come in a number of colours but if you really want to get your monster on check out the GS-2 which includes the ‘Grip Reaper’ and ‘TorchTip Silver’ models pictured above. If you wood (see what I did there) prefer a hand carved model there are currently 2 available – http://guitargrip.com/prod_Carved.htm both equally as creepy as each other. If you really want to push the boat out how about the Air Brushed series? I particularly like the Ride/Lightning.

Check out http://guitargrip.com for details and join them on Facebook here: http://www.facebook.com/gripstudios.

(Via Guitar Noize.)

Updated. The buzz around European music streaming service Spotify’s United States launch just keeps getting louder.

A report published Friday on the Noisecast tech blog places Spotify’s US launch date between July 5 and July 15, citing an email exchange between a Noisecast source and major record label executive. The emails also ‘suggest that Spotify may launch as an invite-only service to start with’ and that the subscription price will be $10 per month, Noisecast reports.

Whether or not it’s totally accurate, the report certainly lines up with other recent talk around Spotify’s stateside debut. Earlier this week, Om Malik reported that Spotify will be a major part of a new music dashboard feature Facebook plans to release at its f8 developer conference in August. And Spotify executive Jonathan Forster recently told Silicon Valley Watcher that Spotify’s US launch is on the way, but would not occur before July 5.

Meanwhile, Spotify has been getting its financial house in order for the US push. Last week the company closed on approximately $100 million in fresh funding to fuel its geographic expansion. The latest round came from a group that included Russian venture capital firm DST and California-based VCs Kleiner Perkins and Accel Partners, all first-time Spotify investors.

Why is Spotify so hotly anticipated in the United States? For one thing, with a Spotify account, you can listen to the same library of music regardless of where you are and which of your devices you’re using. It’s the same cloud-based mentality behind some of the latest big offerings from Google (with Google Music), Apple (with iCloud) and Netflix (with Netflix streaming.) In many ways, Spotify fits right into the increasingly always-connected way many of us live now.

Update: Spotify’s US launch is indeed on track for mid-July — not July 5, as some other sources have claimed — according to a source with knowledge of the company’s plans. That confirms the rumors first published Friday morning that Spotify’s US launch will occur in July.

Spotify will be made available in the US under a three-tiered pricing model, the source said: A free ad-supported service, a $5/month subscription, and a $10/month subscription. The US pricing scheme will be very similar to the three-tiered revenue model Spotify already has in place in Europe.

The company does not have a more specific launch date nailed down at the moment, because Spotify is still sorting out a few kinks associated with the US debut, the source said.

(Via GigaOM.)

Google has begun testing an integration of voice search with the Google.com search engine.

Helpful tipster Matt Schlicht first spotted the feature earlier Monday afternoon. Voice search detects your computer’s microphone settings and can open up a ‘Speak now’ widget to detect your words and transcribe them into a search query.

Android phone owners should be familiar with Google Voice Search; it’s available in the Google Search widget. Google Voice Search on Android even translates voice commands into actions. For example, ‘Directions to Empire State Building New York’ will get you instant driving directions to Manhattan’s famous landmark.

Google has been working hard on improving the accuracy of its voice search product. It now recognizes Chinese and learns from your speech patterns. Perhaps now Google believes it’s accurate enough to begin testing with the general populace.

Right now, voice search seems to be in a limited testing period. We’ve reached out to Google for comment.

While searching by voice may be easier than typing in some cases, we don’t think you’re suddenly going to see an uptick in people shouting out their search queries. As our tipster pointed out on Twitter today, Google Voice Search ‘works surprisingly well but is very awkward to use in the office.’

What do you think of Google Voice Search? Should Google roll it out on its homepage?

Update: Google’s experiment is confirmed. ‘Google is constantly experimenting with new features,’ was the only thing a Google spokesperson would tell us officially, though.

The Google Voice Search Icon

Google.com users with access to the experiment might see this page the next time they visit Google.com

Google Voice Search Widget

Talking into the mic activates the Google Voice Search widget.

Google Voice Search Results

(Via Mashable!.)

Brad Pitt

Elvis

George Lucas

Hugh Laurie

Jack Nicholson

Jared Leto

Keira Knightley

Marilyn Manson

Dr. Evil merged with Kim ll-Sung

Rowan Atkinson

Steve McQueen

Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes

There’s a lot involved in photography, and so many things to remember it can be overwhelming, especially for beginners. Camerascan seem complicated, and photo editing software is packed with features. Then there are concepts like lighting and composition that must be mastered in order to achieve those perfect shots. With so many things to learn, sometimes a little help is welcomed. So for this post, we’ve rounded up a collection of photography cheat sheets and quick references that should come in very handy.

Digital SLR Cameras & Photography Cheat Sheet

Creative Gel Cheat Sheet

Photography Cheat Sheet

Reflector Card Cheat Sheet

Photoshop CS4 Cheat Sheet

Photoshop Elements Cheat Sheet

Lightroom 3 Shortcuts Cheat Sheet

Canon EOS Rebel T1i/500D Cheat Sheet

Nikon D5000 Cheat Sheet

Portrait Lighting Cheat Sheet

Apple Aperture Cheat Sheet

Nikon D40/D40X Cheat Sheet

Photoshop Black and White Cheat Sheet

(Via Web Design Ledger.)

Sing-a-Ma-Jigs – Meet the latest toy craze. Which also happen to be quite possibly the most annoying toys in the world.