teknia micro news

10 Weirdest Pet Accessories

Hmm... Weird, some of these look like good ideas...

PC Mag Link:

   

Give your pets some TLC with these over-the-top items, including the vibrating pet massager, automated litter box, and treat launcher.
By Jennifer L. DeLeo 11.30.06
According to the American Pet Products Manufacturers Association (APPMA), 63 percent of U.S. households, or 69.1 million homes, own a pet. Whether you care for a cat, dog, bird, or other small animal, it's hard not to pamper them, especially when they're so darn cute. In fact, the APPMA reports that pet owners spent over $36 billion on their pets in 2005. That's a lot of Vet visits, food, and toys! If you're a pet owner, you probably go out of your way to ensure that your pet is both safe and satisfied, and for some of you this means buying some of the most over-the-top products you've ever seen. At least that's what we thought when we rounded up products for this week's top ten list. Check out some of the weirdest accessories around for your canine and feline companions.

FDA Done Waiting for RFID

Link: ACSH - Facts and Fears   
By Wyatt Yankus

In its 2006 Update Report released on June 9th, the FDA’s Counterfeit Drug Task Force recommended that the FDA not renew its stay on the implementation of the Prescription Drug Marketing Act (PDMA). This law, originally passed in 1988, included the requirement that all members of the drug supply chain provide “pedigrees,” documents that include information on all transactions through which a particular drug has passed from manufacturer to distributors to pharmacies.

Implementation of this requirement has been delayed for nearly two decades due to pressure from industry groups, most recently in the FDA Task Force’s 2004 Final Report when it issued a stay until December 2006 because it believed that “e-pedigrees,” based on radio frequency identification tags (RFID), would be much more efficient and counterfeit-proof than paper pedigrees. As late as the 2005 Update report, the Task Force was still holding out hope that RFID could be implemented in the supply chain by the target date of 2007.

Why I Yahoo and Why You Should Yahoo Too

Yahoo has cool titles for the people that work there; like Chief Yahoo and Technical Yahoo.

Seriously, I examined why I use Yahoo stuff and was amazed at how Yahoo software effects my tech life. The convenience factor comes into play, ease of use, shared calendars and peace of mind for quality apps that generally play well with others. This post grew from what I originally intended; just a heads-up about Yahoo to more of a review.

Yahoo also gets my vote for one of the Top 5 booths at CES 2006. The Yahoo 'tent house' showed off some home automation and cool stuff we'll get soon.

I learned a bit more about Yahoo Music services while I was at CES too.  The Yahoo! Music Unlimited Service starts at $5/month with access to over a million songs. So it's a great way to try music before you buy it. I tested it to see if it had a few of my old-time favorites like Poco and the service easily passed. 

The Yahoo! Music Unlimited To Go service is $9.95/month and allows copying the music to cd or portable devices.

With Yahoo! Music Unlimited To Go, you can transfer your subscription songs to your compatible portable device.

• Play and save over 1 million full length tracks*
• Buy downloads for 79¢
• LAUNCHcast Plus commercial free radio
• Share subscription songs with your friends**

If you don't plan to transfer subscription songs to a compatible portable device, save with Yahoo! Music Unlimited

The inside scoop on setting up My Yahoo.
Use your gmail email account to set it up!  Nope, it's not restricted to just people that use Yahoo Mail or Yahoo's instant messenger.  Gmail email allots more storage and is more polite if your account is inactive; a gentle reminder first instead of disabling your account, then making you jump throgh hoops to re-enable the account.

Step 1:
The easiest way to enter the Yahoo! World is to get a Yahoo Messenger (IM) account (like I mentioned before, use your gmail account to set it up) Download and install Yahoo Messenger from this link: http://messenger.yahoo.com/

Notes:
Carefully go through the Yahoo setup and don't let it set your home page to Yahoo etc  You can undo the 'suggestions it makes during install but...well you know what a pain that is (It's especially bad during the widget install)

My Yahoo Advantages:

My Yahoo is a very good personal portal that gives you an online PIM (personal information manager) Including a NotePad , Contact List and Calendar
(also good to set as your home page in IE or FireFox)
View the headlines from news you prefer
Add the feeds you like (HHTS News, teknia tech etc)

I created second and third pages just for feeds from tech sites and HHTS, teknia News, teknia tech etc by going to the sites and getting the link from the small orange button that indicates an RSS Feed or syndication link.

Add local movie and TV schedules

Yahoo Messenger
http://messenger.yahoo.com/
The easiest to use and best IM or messenger client available today is Yahoo Messenger. The major advantage to using Yahoo Messenger is that you can send an IM and it doesn't 'bonk' if the other person isn't online. They receive the IM the next time they login.

Adding a webcam is simple too, plug it in and it recognizes it. Double click on someones Yahoo ID and push the Webcam Icon. My wife keeps an eye on our dogs from work this way.

Yahoo Calendar:
The best way to share an on-line calendar if you don't have Microsoft Exchange. It's accessed and administrated through your Yahoo email account area.

I setup a shared calendar on Yahoo that my friends and family can access (if they have a Yahoo Account)

Yahoo Desktop Search
I'm no longer using a desktop search client but last summer Yahoo Desktop search was the best of all I tested. (Google, Microsoft's awful beta and others)

Yahoo Widgets:
http://widgets.yahoo.com/
Yahoo Widgets bring more Windows users closer to the Mac Feel than any other *ahem*, borrowed interface available from other software vendors.

Suggested Widget Use:
Add local weather and setup the task tracker for OutLook
The picture viewer that randomly selects pictures from your 'My Pictures' folder is very nice.