Normally I don’t go around telling anyone to try things, but this is different.

Firefox 3.5 was released today and is much “Safer, Faster, and easier to use” then IE or the other web programs out there.

One of the newest things they have incorporated, you no longer have to get a plug-in to play video, the browser handles the overhead and the calls for video.

Give it a try:

Firefox 3.5

Verizon Wireless

New York, NY – June 16, 2009 –

Verizon, InComm Retailers and the USO are launching an initiative to let Americans demonstrate their appreciation for armed forces personnel serving America worldwide, just in time for the July 4 holiday.

From June 22 to July 4, consumer purchases of Verizon Prepaid Long Distance Phone Cards at participating local retailers will be matched by Verizon, on a minute-for-minute basis, and donated to active duty personnel for international and domestic long-distance calling in the form of 100-minute prepaid calling cards.  The cards will be distributed by the USO to U.S. military men and women worldwide, with an emphasis on serving deployed troops in Iraq, Afghanistan and throughout Southwest Asia, as well as to wounded soldiers who are returning home.

Verizon will donate a minimum of 1 million minutes to the program.

“The prepaid calling cards continue to be a very useful way to keep our troops connected to their families, and we are excited to once again partner with Verizon and thank InComm retailers for providing their assistance,” said Sloan Gibson, USO president and CEO. “With this support, the USO will continue to make a difference in the lives of our service men and women.”

David Skogen, manager of Verizon’s Prepaid Business Unit, said: “We are honored once again to create a win-win-win program for everyone involved, particularly the heroic men and women serving our country.  By purchasing prepaid calling cards, consumers generate matching minutes for military men and women worldwide, which our friends at the USO deliver.  These matching minutes enable our troops to stay in close touch with their friends and families and share news and developments with them, which is a critically important, morale-building benefit.”

Participating InComm retailers include:

• Casey’s General Stores
• Holiday Station Stores
• Jackson Food Stores
• Kum and Go
• Oasis Stop N Go LLC
• Twin Stops

As a leading communications provider to the federal government, Verizon throughout the year makes technology and resources available to military personnel and their families around the world.

About the USO
The USO (United Service Organizations) lifts the spirits of America’s troops and their families.  The USO is a nonprofit, charitable organization, relying on the generosity of the American people to support its programs and services.  The USO is supported by Worldwide Strategic Partners AT&T Inc., BAE Systems, Booz Allen Hamilton, Inc., Clear Channel Communications, The Coca-Cola Company, Gallery Furniture, S & K Sales Co. and TriWest Healthcare Alliance.  Other corporate donors, including the United Way and Combined Federal Campaign (CFC-11381), have joined millions of individual donors to support the USO.  For more information, please visit our Web site at www.uso.org.

About Verizon
Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE:VZ), headquartered in New York, is a global leader in delivering broadband and other wireless and wireline communications services to mass market, business, government and wholesale customers.  Verizon Wireless operates America’s most reliable wireless network, serving more than 86 million customers nationwide.  Verizon’s Wireline operations provide converged communications, information and entertainment services over the nation’s most advanced fiber-optic network.  Wireline also includes Verizon Business, which delivers innovative and seamless business solutions to customers around the world.  A Dow 30 company, Verizon employs a diverse workforce of more than 237,000 and last year generated consolidated operating revenues of more than $97 billion.  For more information, visit www.verizon.com.

About InComm
InComm is the industry leading marketer, distributor and technology innovator of stored-value gift and prepaid products using its state-of-the-art point-of-sale transaction technology and payment solutions to revolutionize retail product sales and customer experiences. With nearly $8 billion in retail sales transactions processed in 2007, InComm is the nation’s largest provider of gift cards, prepaid wireless products, reloadable debit cards, digital music downloads, content, games, software and bill payment solutions. InComm partners with consumer brand leaders around the world to provide more than 145,000 retail locations the products and services their customers demand. Since 1992, InComm’s patented technologies have made the buying process easier for consumers while streamlining the selling process for product and retail partners. To learn more about InComm, visit www.incomm.com or call 1.800.352.3084. InComm is headquartered in Atlanta with offices in Japan, Canada, the United Kingdom, Puerto Rico, Colorado, Texas, Florida, New Jersey, Oregon, Arkansas, Alabama, Minnesota and Mississippi.  For more information, visit www.incomm.com.

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Media Contact:
Bob Elek, Verizon, 813-483-2541
Stefanie Scott, Verizon, 512-495-6730
Travis Burgin, The USO, 703-740-4982
Jenn Boutwell, InComm, 770-882-2240

And I mean WOW!!

It is not easy for me to get excited about a Internet browser, but Apple released Safari 4 for Windows and for the Mac yesterday (Beta).

I am had a “GEEK-GASM” after in installed this piece of software. The way they let you browse and look at web pages, new and so easy to use, and best of all.. FAST.

Some of the features:

Top Sites

Apple Safari 4-Beta Top Sites Function

Thanks to Top Sites, you can enjoy a stunning, at-a-glance preview of your favorite websites without lifting a finger. Safari 4 Beta tracks the sites you browse and ranks your favorites, presenting up to 24 thumbnails on a single page. You can even customize the display by pinning a favorite site to a specific location in the grid. That locks it into position, so you know just where to find it every time you open Top Sites.

Wonder which sites have changed since your last visit? Sites with a star in the upper-right corner have new content. A single click opens the page and updates its thumbnail. Whenever you want to return to your ever-evolving Top Sites page, just click the new Top Sites button in the bookmarks bar.

Cover Flow

New to Safari, Cover Flow offers a highly visual way of reviewing your site history and bookmarked sites, presenting full-page previews of the websites that look exactly as they did when you last visited them.

One look is all you need to recognize the site you want to visit. Simply flip through website previews in Cover Flow the same way you flip through album art in iTunes. Directional arrows let you browse forward and back. Or you can quickly flip through multiple sites using the slider. And when you find the site you want, simply click to open it.

Apple Safari 4-Beta Cover Flow

Full History Search

With Full History Search and Cover Flow, what you see is where you went. Safari introduces a dramatic new way to revisit sites, letting you flip through full-page previews of the sites you visited in the past. You may not have total recall, but Safari does, automatically storing all the text and a thumbnail of every page in your history. That makes it easy for Safari to get results even if you remember little about the site you’re searching for.

Just type a word or phrase in the History Search field in Top Sites, and Safari quickly presents you with a list of possibilities. In fact, you can search for anything that was on a page you visited, even photo captions. To jog your memory, Safari presents the sites it finds in Cover Flow, giving you the opportunity to spot the right site on sight.

Apple Safari 4-Beta History function

and much more. Click the link above to take a look. So far so good on my end!!

DeeDee, CrazyCajun, Myself, and 8404 (If he has recovered from Jet Lag) will be on tonight to help spread the holiday cheer.

Want to talk about getting that new XBox 360, or the game for it?  How about the Nintendo Wii, or the Sony PS3? Got a place that is cutting great deals?  Come tell us.

Looking for a Airline deal to get home to suprise the folks, wife or whomever?  There are great sales going on right now, I myself experienced it buying my son’s ticket from DFW to O’hare.  The Price had gone down by over 150.00 from 2 weeks ago.

Got a great Holiday Recipe? How about sharing it with us.

In other words it’s just a Corpsman.com Family gathering.  Come join us.

And remember, tomorrow night (Wednesday) we will be hosting our Live Corpsman.com Live show @ 2100 EST.

The 2008 Military Appreciation Monday dinner will be held on Monday, November 17, 2008 from 5 pm to 9 pm in all Golden Corral Restaurants.

The free “thank you” dinner is available to any person who has ever served in the United States Military. If you are a veteran, retired, currently serving, in the National Guard or Reserves, you are invited to participate in Golden Corral’s Military Appreciation Monday dinner.

To date, Golden Corral restaurants have provided over 1.8 million free meals and contributed over $2.53 million to the Disabled American Veterans organization.

Applebee’s offers free meals to military

Active-duty members, retirees and veterans can get a free meal at a limited number of Applebee’s Neighborhood Grill & Bar restaurants on Veterans Day, with proof of military service.

The 164 participating restaurants in 12 states are testing this promotion, which will offer one of the following entrees: House Sirloin, Riblet Basket, Fiesta Lime Chicken, Quesadilla Burger or Oriental Chicken Salad. Traditional side dishes are included.

“It’s an honor to host an event that helps the neighborhood come together and say thanks to our veterans and active servicemen and women,” said Mike Archer, president of Applebee’s Services, Inc., in a statement announcing the offer.

Troops and veterans must show proof of military service. This can include:

• Military ID card.

• Military retired ID card.

• DD 214 discharge certificate.

• A Leave and Earnings Statement.

• Citation or commendation.

• Photograph in uniform.

• Card from a veterans’ service organization.

Applebee Restaurants  honoring Vets:

The Lowe’s discount is available Nov. 6 through Nov. 11 on purchases of up to $5,000 in U.S. stores from merchandise in stock and special order. The maximum discount would be $500. The discount does not apply to sales at http://www.lowes.com, previous sales, or purchases of services or gift cards. To qualify, you must present a valid military ID or other proof of service.

The Home Depot discount is available Nov. 6 through Nov. 12 on purchases up to $2,000, for a maximum discount of $200. The discount is offered at The Home Depot stores, The Home Depot Design Center locations, Yardbirds and EXPO Design Center locations. To get the discount, you must provide proof of military service when checking out, and the discount will be applied at the register.

In addition to providing military discounts at specific times during the year for the last several years, the two retailers extend benefits for their employees called to active duty, and actively seek to hire military personnel after they leave the service.

Other efforts include The Home Depot’s Project Homefront, in which $1 million and 1 million volunteer hours have been donated to help military families with home repairs while their service member is deployed.

Iphone-3g-white

First of all I am extremly happy with my I-Phone 3G.  I ended up picking up the 16GB White Version, and I could not be happier.  The only thing that I feel is lacking are 2 things:

1. A Keyboard, I have to type on the screen and I have big fingers.. Kinda hard to do.

2. Cannot replace Battery, I cannot buy a extra, and if you use your I-Phone the way I do, almost like a 2nd portable computer when I am away from my computer, it would help if I was able to “HOT SWAP” a battery if I am away from a plug.

These are minor though, I can deal with them, and really I have found I have adapted to things I never thought I would.  I do feel there is a new paradigm being built here with phones, which are more and more becoming “Portable Computers”.
But, I digress, and will leave that for a nother “TECH” article.

The reason I am writing this, I have to get my wife a new phone in December.  Since she is a Nurse, she needs some med info, really good web browsing etc on her phone.  The thing about the I-Phone it is not really the best for her line of work, plus she hates not having a keyboard.

blackberry-bold

So we are back to trying to figure out which phone to get.  Since I know the I-Phone is out, it will probably be the new Google “Android” phone or the Blackberry Bold.  The Blackberry will be going on sale tomorrow finally, and if you remember, this was the phone I wanted in the first place, and is supposedly going to be very nice.

Google Android

The Andoid is itself a 1st Generation phone, works like a I-Phone but has a Keyboard.

IF any of you out there have either phone in the next few days, please email me @ admin1@corpsman.com, I would love to hear what you think, I would like to post the replies on here if possible as well, especially with this down market.

D/C

Well I am buying a I-Phone today.  Here is why…

Cost and functionality.

One of the reasons I was going to get the Blackberry Bold, Video which can be uploaded to a service.

This was turned on its ear on Tuesday when I bought the “FLIP ULTRA”.

As you can see it goes for $149.00, I picked mine up at WAL-MART.  It is already gone as my wife has told me it is “HER” camera now and I can pick up my own later, what does this mean?  It means this movie tool is the simplest easiest camera I have ever used.

The Break down:

2 gigs of memory, which holds 60 mins of video.
USB, with Onboard software, You can plug it into “ANY” computer and download your film.
Runs on 2 AA batteries, you can buy a A/C adapter for it, but it runs real nice on the batteries.
So small can fit into your pocket, and you won’t be bothered by it.
2x Zoom.
Sofware automatically Uploads to Youtube, MySpace and other online applications.

Ok so Wy would I drop the Bold for this?  Well the biggest reason….

PRICE!!

I can get the I-Phone for 199.00 (Base Unit) plus my service plan.   + Flip Camera $149.00

Blackberry Bold, (No Price avail yet, but thought to be $500.00) with Service plan which costs more then the I-Phone plan.

Yeah I will have to carry 2 devices, but honestly, It won’t be that bad as the Bold was a Bulky phone anyways, so it is a wash, but my video capabilities will be much better then what I would have had with the bold.  There are also more applications on the I-Phone.

Trust me that I did not want to jump on the I-Phone Bandwagon, but facts are facts, Apple makes a great product and I am tired of Windows Mobile.  I think with this plan I can better myself as well as MCS-productions.  (I will explain what this is in a later update!).

SO WINNER!!

I-PHONE 2.0!!!!

Can Someone, “ANYONE” build a phone that works?? Maybe do some QA to make sure a product you are about to release to the wild, or have released the wild “WORKS?”…

Apple continues to have problems with the I-PHONE version 2.0 (3G).  Even though you are in area that has a sufficent 3G signal, the I-Phone keeps dropping the fast signal and drops you back to the tortise reception of the Edge Network.

A article here at the CNET Blogs area claims that the Blackberry Bold might be having the same issues quote:

There are lots of people reporting on the spotty iPhone 3G reception issues and according to Barron’s it looks like the BlackBerry Bold may be experiencing those same 3G reception issues. The Bold is available only in a couple countries at the moment and isn’t yet available here in the U.S. so there is the possibility that the Bold’s software will be updated prior to the release.

Well the only thing I do know, The Blackberry has not been released yet due to some bugs they have been working on.  I would rather a company fix said bugs prior to release, then have me be the beta tester for them to fix the problems.  Right now Apple has millions of Beta Testers for their I-Phone.

So the wait goes on..

What do you think??

Think I am Nuts?

Leave a comment below..

D/C

This comes from our Forums.. (Did you know we had forums?? Just hit the forums link above), from HMC-FMF-PJ.. Enjoy.. Definitley waiting on the Blackberry Bold now.  It is supposed to come out next month. To many issues with the I-Phone.  I now give you the terrific post from HMC-FMF-PJ

So how many of you proud iPhone owners know that Apple has built a backdoor into your phone so they can control what your phone does.

Apple decides what you are permitted to download and Apple decides what applications will run. Apple can choose to delete things off your phone without your knowledge or consent and Apple can simply shut your iPhone down so it no longer functions. And I am sure they told you that when you bought it.

But, hey, its all in the name of security and designed to keep you safe from the boogie man. That is why it was a secret function that customers were not informed of and initially pushed off as a crazy paranoid conspiracy theory when it was first discovered. Now that the cat is out of the bag, Steve Jobs has just confirmed the kill switch is real but has a positive spin selling it as a condom for your iPhone. Its there to keep you safe, trust me….

Jobs is quoted saying: “Hopefully we never have to pull that lever, but we would be irresponsible not to have a lever like that to pull.”

If only Microsoft would build a lever to disable computers…
If only GM would build a lever to disable cars…
If only Nintendo would build a lever to disable Wii…
If only DirectTV would build a lever to disable tv’s…

The world would be such a more responsible and safer place if a corporation (disgruntled employee or resourceful hacker) could shut you down or redirect your activities anytime they wanted to…

This and they there is talk in the tech areas that the 3G Chip in the I-Phone are having major errors and they there is talk that Apple is silently exchanging the I-Phones that are brought in with problems.
What do you think?

Leave a comment below or join our Forums.

Da-Chief