One Laptop Per Child vs. SocialVibe (and some tips on protecting your computer)

Candy posted about this SocialVibe widget you put on your blog, MySpace, etc. I thought I would play around with it. You get to choose which cause you want to support, and the only one that I liked was the One Laptop Per Child program because I love the idea of technology and communication tools being introduced into an area where people don't know anything about email or "surfing the web". I think the idea behind the OLPC program is pretty cool, but I know there have been issues with the program, which you can read about on Wikipedia or just by doing a Google search for "OLPC". I think the program will improve over time, though. I wish SocialVibe would let you choose any charity you wanted such as the Alzheimer's Association. I like to donate money to that charity sometimes because my grandmother died from Alzheimer's, and it is not a nice way to go.

Here is what the SocialVibe widget looks like ...

You also choose the sponsor that appears in your widget. I chose XBOX since I actually have an XBOX 360 and play it quite often. I think you earn points whenever someone views the webpage or blog entry or profile page that contains your SocialVibe widget. I think those points are later converted into money for the charity somehow so that's cool. I'll have to monitor it to figure out how it works because I am still new to it.

In other news, Tricky has a new album coming out called Knowle West Boy. There is an article about it here ...

http://blog.wired.com/music/2008/05/want-a-free-pou.html

I have always liked Tricky's music. I even like his acting in The Fifth Element. I like it when he does remixes of others' songs, such as Garbage or Bjork, too. Here is one of his songs, "For Real", that I like ...

In other news still ... I think there are a lot of people out who do not have anti-virus and anti-spyware protection on their computers. One of the biggest challenges with connecting the whole world with networks, broadband internet connections, etc., is that there are going to be tons of people with unprotected computers. Here is a website that will test your computer for viruses, spyware, etc., for free ...

http://housecall.trendmicro.com

Here is a free anti-virus program ...

http://free.grisoft.com (I would think it's better than nothing).

You may want to read about it here before you download it, though. (that link will take you to an article on LifeHacker, which is a great website.)

Other programs I like are the free versions of Spyware Doctor and Lavasoft's Ad-Aware. You can also download Microsoft's Windows Defender for free.

Once you download any of these programs, you should always turn on some sort of auto-update feature to make sure you are using the latest version of the program. If there is no auto-update feature, then you can usually go somewhere like "Tools" or "About" within the program to find an update option.

Sometimes, these programs are going to scan your computer and tell you that there are "cookies" on your system, but "cookies" are not that bad. An example of a cookie is when I go to TVGuide.com, and I customize the channel setup to reflect Time Warner Cable in Austin, TX. Well, that is a cookie, but I don't want to remove it because I don't want to have to setup the channels each time I go to that site. Therefore, don't freak out if a program tells you there are tons of cookies on your computer after a scan.

I like to go to My Computer, right-click on the main hard drive (in my case, it is C:), and choose Disk Cleanup to see what unnecessary items are in my hard drive (especially in the "temp" folder) ...

I also like to go to My Computer, and then choose the Add/Remove programs option to see if there any unnecessary programs installed on my computer. Be careful that you don't delete something just because you don't recognize the name, though. If you are unsure about a program, you can always do a Google search on it to see what it is. A lot of the time, it is a vital program that came with your computer, and you should not delete it.

Speaking of Anti-Virus software, I like to use McAfee for everything, but it does cost money. It's nice to be able to install the McAfee programs on more than one computer, though. I have let a lot of my friends download my McAfee programs onto their computers because they did not have any anti-virus software already installed or they had some awful program like Norton installed, which I hate.

Another way to keep your computer (and your money) safe is to be aware of phishing scams. Banks and credit unions will never ask you for your information through email or by phone unless you initiated the conversation. However, if you get an email from a bank such as Chase (which I have gotten), and it is asking you to verify your account number, SSN, etc., then you need to mark it as SPAM, delete it, report it as phishing, etc.

Gmail has a really cool option that allows you to report a message as phishing. Here is screen cap (or capture) of it ...

The email in that picture is definitely spam, but it is not a phishing email. Phishing emails usually come from banks, PayPal, etc. They pretend to be from the real company, but they are really from crooks who are good at disguising the information in an email. The cool thing  about Gmail is that the more people who use it, the safer it gets because if one person marks a message as phishing and/or spam, then Gmail is going to go ahead and mark that message as spam for all the other users who receive it. That's why I wish everyone would use Gmail. To me, it really is the best email provider out there.

Here is a website from a good credit union in Texas that will tell you all about scams that relate to phishing, cashier's check fraud, Ebay fraud, Craigslist fraud, lottery fraud, etc. ...

https://www.rbfcu.org/NBO/Jsp/Reference/OnlineSecurity.jsp

You can also try these websites ...

http://www.fakechecks.org
http://www.ckfraud.org