Your cell phone is a tool — it’s great for staying in touch with everyone from your boss to your mom. But you can do much more with a phone. With SMS, you can run your whole life. With just a text message, you can track your expenses and add items to your Amazon wishlist: no more messing around with scraps of paper to try to remember something until you get back to your desk. You don’t even need a phone that lets you install applications to use these tools: they’re all just a text message away.

1. Track Your Packages: Got a package coming from FedEx, UPS, USPS or DHL? If you give TrackThis the tracking number, the site can send you a text every time your package’s location changes.
2. Get Stock Quotes: Yahoo! Alerts will keep you updated about the current price of your stocks — but it also offers you more specific text message alerts, such as an SMS when your stock rises or falls by an amount you specify. Yahoo! Alerts can also update you about the weather, sports and other news.
3. Track Your Expenses: Whether you’re tracking expenses for reimbursement from your boss or you’re just managing your own money, you can text your expenses to Xpenser. The site offers a free service that not only records your expenses but also analyzes them and creates reports you can send off to your boss.
4. Stop Smoking: If you’re working on quitting smoking, you can track your progress by texting Qwitter. You can also send journal updates to the site, keeping a record of where you’ve had problems and where it’s gotten easier.
5. Pay Your Bills: Depending on what country you live in, you can pay your bills by text message. Many utility companies and cell phone providers offer such an option — check your providers to see if they offer SMS payments. You can also send small payments through sites like Sepomo, but both you and the recipient have to set up accounts to do so.
6. Search For An Apartment: Looking for a new place to live? If you start your search on Apartments.com, you can send information about specific apartments to your phone as a text message, making it easier to compare apartments on the go.
7. Read The Classifieds: If you’re constantly checking Craigslist for new furniture or new jobs, you can get updates in your favorite category texted directly to your phone with Craig’s List Buddy.
8. Update Your Amazon Wishlist: Kwiry’s main function is to allow you to send text messages to yourself — listing reminders, tasks and such that the site then turns into an email or to do list. But Kwiry also allows you to add items to your Amazon wishlist, update your Netflix queue, add events to your calendar or run searches. You can also update Facebook from your phone with Kwiry.
9. Search Google: While you can’t get a huge list of responses from Google over SMS, you can use it to find nearby restaurants, get directions, check area codes of mysterious phone calls and more.
10. Order Pizza: Domino’s, Papa John’s and Pizza Hut all offer the opportunity to order pizza by text message. You’ll have to visit your favorite pizza provider’s website to set up an account, but after that, you’ll be able to order a pizza by SMS any time you want.

You may notice that several of these tools rely on Twitter. That’s because Twitter provides an easy way to send updates via SMS and is a free tool. You can create your own account at Twitter for free and share what you’re up to through text messages — and find out what your friends are up to the same way.

A lot of cell phone and gadget blogs tend to focus on the newest gadgets and announcements from major carriers. Here at Cell Phones.org and the Mobile Maven, we like to focus more on the People using the cell phones then the phone itself. To that end, we’re starting a series. This “How To” Series will address different professions and hopefully show how cell phones can have a positive impact on your work and productivity.

We’ve chosen to start the series off with … Paleontologists! Why Paleontologists, you ask? Well for one, we love dinosaurs, fossils and everything prehistoric. We also feel that it’s one of the most under appreciated, underpaid disciplines in the academic world and we decided to try and give some glory to the great folks who work in the profession!

Without further ado, here are a few ways you can be a better paleontologist with a cell phone.

• Backup GPS - If your primary GPS goes down (or you don’t have a GPS in the first place) you can use the GPS on the iPhone, Android and many other cell phones to provide a fairly accurate location. If you’re short on equipment but not on volunteers, you can have them use cell phone based GPS to maximize their usefullness.
• Flashlight - Use one of the myriad iPhone and Android apps to turn your cell into a backup flashlight.
• Photographing - Did your camera break? While cell phone cameras are no match for proper photography, they’re great in a pinch. Better yet, if you have a volunteer who has a question but you don’t have the time, they can snap a quick pick and text it to you for you to look at later. It’s also great for areas where you may not have planned to research (Such as vacation, for example) but still want to take a picture to research a sudden new find later on. Also, it’s great for taking pictures of dinosaurs..
• Note taking - while pen and paper are great, it can often help to record your notes both vocally and digitally so you can easily send a copy. We recommend using a cell phone with a separate digital memory card so that in case something happens to the phone you still have your data.
• eMail - So you can check if you accepted to that Ph.D program or if your paper was accepted, anytime, anywhere.
• Dinosaur Shoot Em Up - While this is not strictly paleontology related, we do think it’s a lot of fun to play an armed to the teeth dinosaur in an airplane sent back in time to rescue eggs while you’re on the go.

Do you have other uses for your cell phone in your field work? Let us know! Feel free to use this post to get your employer/sponsor/etc to add an iPhone/Android to the budget. Happy Hunting!

We’re going back in time - a time when your cell phone would not stand a chance squeezing itself into your back pocket (ouch!). Do you remember those clunky phones whose shape resembled one of those Tetris pieces?

Let’s go back to the rockin’ year of 1973, when Dr. Martin Cooper of Motorola made the first phone call on the DynaTAC 8000x to cellular rival, Joel Engel of AT&T’s Bell Labs, during a stroll through the streets of New York City. This was considered an innovation, as the phone was small enough to actually be carried! Yes, you heard me, carried. Weighing in it at 28 ounces, it screamed portable, lightweight and sexy. It “featured” nine additional special keys: Rcl (Recall), Sto (Store), Pwr (Power) Clr (Clear), Fcn (Function), Lock, Snd (Send), End, and Vol (Volume). It also flaunted its stuff with a red LED screen that would show the number you were dialing. It was 10 inches tall not including that massive antenna and had a battery life for approximately 60 minutes of talk time. And don’t think for a moment that technology like this isn’t going to cost you, the DynaTAC 8000x would cost you about $4,000 in its heyday.

Swedish-born company, Ericsson was also a player in the cell phone world. It opened with “Curt” in 1987 and then in 1989, “Olivia” came along as Ericsson’s first GSM all-digital mobile phone.

In 1989, the DynaTAC was superseded by the Motorola MicroTAC…the first flip phone! This phone was known around the world for being the smallest and lightest phone on the market. The price tag would run you anywhere from $2500 to $3500 for this particular model. It was substantially lighter at 12.3 ounces and only 9 inches long when open. The funny thing about this phone was the antenna, as it was purely aesthetic and served no actual purpose!

The 90s rolled around and cell phones became a staple item; while still somewhat of a luxury, with the technology boom, you HAD to have a cell phone.

In 1993 Bell South/IBM introduced the first ever PDA, the Simon Personal Communicator. It was a phone, calculator, contact book, pager (what is that??), fax machine and email device - all in one. For a mere $900 this phone was yours! Motorola also came out with the StarTAC in 1996. It was the lightest and smallest phone on the market.

Then in 1998, Nokia came out with the 6160. You know the phone I’m talking about. EVERYONE had one of these. I think I would pay to see one in person again. It was by far the most popular phone of its time and best-selling by Nokia’s records. I had one - loved that phone!

Let’s segue to the year 2000! Cell phone moguls were on a rampage trying to come up with the latest and greatest PDA’s and cell phones. People were carrying around multiple devices to stay “in the loop.”

One of the more popular PDA’s was Kyocera’s QCP-6035. It was a HUGE upgrade to the Simon Personal Communicator and an answer to the many problems that plagued cell phone users. The QCP-6035 combined the communication features of a regular cell phone with convenient access to information that you would find in your PDA. Cost for this beauty was around $600.

2001 and 2002 were big years too. The Handspring Treo 180 surfaced as the first phone to have a QWERTY keyboard and in 2002 the Blackberry 5810 came out and included voice capability.

But, I think it was Sprint with the Sanyo SCP-5300 that really changed what people wanted in a cell phone, as this model featured a built-in camera. The camera phone had arrived!! Then, Motorola wowed everyone with the slim design and modern appeal when they introduced the Razr v3. That was definitely a cool looking phone. Blackberry, Motorola, Sony Ericcson, Nokia and others continued to evolve with different models and adding more and more features. But it wasn’t until 2007 when everything went berserk.
Drum roll…

The iPhone! That’s right, Apple did the unthinkable. They combined a cell phone, camera, PDA, iPod and oh so much more into one slim and sexy cellular device. We waited in line for hours to get one. We paid waaaay too much for one. But it was worth it. Because you were now part of the elite, the Apple-ites (did I just make that up? I think so!). Despite it’s initial flaws people looked past that. Almost as if their breath was taken away each time they gazed upon their iPhone. Ahhhh…iPhone, I love you more than my wife and kids.

So, we’ve come a long way from a 2-pounder, clunky mobile phone to a 4.8 ounce know-it-all iPhone. Which begs the question…what will they think of next???

Chances are that you’ve been out and come across a question that you couldn’t quite answer. Rather than jotting down the question and waiting until you get home to hop on Wikipedia, you can now, more than likely, find the mobile solution using a new generation of iPhone Apps designed for inquisitive minds:

Q: What Does that Word Mean, Exactly?

A(pp): Whether you are perplexed in the course of an (excessively) cerebral conversation, or puzzling over a crossword solution, Dictionarie is a dynamic iPhone dictionary that will define even the most arcane word. Even if you don’t know exactly how to spell the word (it happens), then the app will suggest a number of homonyms that will help you hone in one the exact word you are looking for.

Q: I don’t feel well; what am I coming down with?

A(pp): Although the iPhone can’t replace your family physician, the WebMD application provides a wealth of information ranging from common symptoms to medical interactions to first-aid tips (complete with diagrams!) The impressive graphical presentation covers nearly every major medication and ailment, providing a virtual doctor right on your phone.

Q: I wonder whether my local library has this book in stock?

A(pp): Rather than running around town looking for a copy of a particular book, you can use the World Cat mobile app to find real-time catalog information on your local branch. That way, you can save valuable time and get the book(s) you need faster.

Q: Who is this President, and why is he on this coin exactly?

A(pp): Sure, there are certain Presidents we all remember well, but there are dozens of others who are only vaguely familiar. With the iPresident app, you can get the full details on every US President down to the most refined details.

Q: I wonder what the landscape of that city is like?

A(pp): Chances are you don’t know any Bogotá residents to give you instant feedback on the topography in Columbia. If you’re traveling to a new city, or just have idle curiosity, the Google Earth app will provide you with a rich source of real-time 3D maps so that you can (virtually) explore new terrain on the fly.

Q: I sure miss reading the Classics, don’t you?

A(pp): Freshman literature experiences aside, the Classics app provides a number of Western masterpieces for your reading pleasure, directly on your phone. Whether you are in the mood for anything from Milton to Shakespeare, you can make your subway commute that much better by connecting with the Masters.

Q: The cosine of “0″ is 1, right?

A(pp): Without going into the theory behind geometry, the Touch Calc app will answer your most scientific questions by emulating a fully functioned calculate on your phone. Going well beyond the basic computation of the phone’s integrated calculator, Touch Calc is on par with more powerful engineering applications and should come in handy for Calculus students and can answers many statistics questions as well.

Q: Did you remember to buy (insert forgotten item here)?

A(pp): On the way home from a busy day, it’s easy to forget to pick up shirts from the dry cleaners or the Kleenex that you badly need at home. Rather than relying upon your memory, the “Remember the Milk” application provides an interactive reminder tool that will keep you on top of your daily chores.

Q: Oh yeah, the constellation that looks like a kite - what’s that called again?

A(pp): Before you send the nearest astrophysicist into insanity (if he or she isn’t there already) the handy Star Map application can provide a wealth of knowledge about stars, constellations and solar conditions that is sure to satisfy the most discerning amateur astronomer.

Q: How can I study for my upcoming test while keeping all these materials in order?

A(pp): Put away those cumbersome flash cards - the Sturdy Cards application allows you to create virtual cards to help you memorize key topics for your next exam or meeting. With thousands of pre-filled cards on major topics, you can take advantage of the existing knowledge base or add your own with a handy interface.

At some point, we all feel like our cell phone companies have gotten the best of us; everyone has a frustrated story about customer service, an agonizing bout with a cancellation fee, or some way that we feel like we’re losing to the big boys. In this financial climate, it’s more important than ever that every customer can hold their own against a cell phone company; here are just a few ways for you to fight back.

Flickr: dbrulz

1.  Salespeople have sales quotas. This is true in virtually every sales-driven industry, and definitely true in cell phone sales. Shop employees will have sales quotas, and if they’ve already met them, they will always be looking to exceed them and gain incentive quotas. While it’s possible that their sales month does not coincide with the calendar month, most frequently they do, so be sure to take your first shot at a plan at the end of the month.

2.  There are ways to get them to waive the activation fee. If you are buying your cell phone from a store (as opposed to online or at WalMart, etc), remember that they really want your business, especially if it means beating out the other carrier or the other franchise store of the same carrier that’s down the road. Especially if there are several stores in close distance of one another, you can bet they want your business. Tell them you want to work with them. Tell them that this deal is totally sealed for you, except that activation fee is really making you hesitate. If you want to sweeten the deal, drop hints about the fact that if you like this, you’re going to switch your whole family or office over to this plan (big business tends to mean big discounts to you).

3.  It’s friendliness, not yelling, that will get you almost anything. Cell phone companies are like airlines; they are used to being nailed to the wall by their customers. The ones that call customer service are usually only doing so to complain, and most of the time they only get angrier and more demanding throughout the call. This is not the way to get what you want. Being kind, respectful, and level-headed will get you shockingly far. If you feel you’re being charged unfairly, calmly ask for an explanation. If you’re frustrated with your service, be even more genuinely nice (anyone can spot fake kindness a mile away, so mean it). Thank them profusely, verbalize that you know you’re asking them to do you a favor but that you’ve been very happy with your service to date and you’d really love to get this easily resolved.

4.  If you are moving overseas, usually your cell phone provider contractually can’t charge you for your cancellation fee. While this is something that you have to check your contract for, it does work in most instances. It also works if you move to a place with absolutely no service. Why? It means that your provider will give you the service you first entered the contract with or the contract is null and void. Because providers will charge you considerable roaming, long distance, and international fees if you move internationally (if they offer service at all), this means that it isn’t the service you initially signed up for. They cannot provide for you as they first promised, so they are beholden to let you out of the contract without penalty, because they failed their end of the bargain, not the other way around. (Flickr: metropolitician)

5.  You can trade people for contracts on sites like Celltrade to get out of your contract. If you aren’t moving overseas and can’t deal with your current contract, CellTrade is a great website that allows you to cash out. You essentially trade places with someone who does want to get into a contract for the remainder of your contract, and you don’t have to pay your cancellation fee. You do have to pay a small fee to switch, but it’s less that twenty bucks and you’ll be the happier for it.

6.  You can dial 411 for free. Yes, it’s true! Don’t let your cell phone company gouge you with ludicrously high 411 fees; just dial 1 800 FREE 411 or 1 800 GOOG 411. The latter hooks you up to Google’s directory service, but both of them give you pretty extensive access to phone databases without you ever having to pay a fee. They’ll even text you the phone number if you want!  (Flickr: dannysullivan)

7.  You can decline the “free trials” upfront to prevent charges later. Come on people. How many times have you signed up for a phone, and when you sign the initial receipt, you see about seven “free trial” programs on your phone. A month later, the free trial is no longer free, and you’re paying $7.99 per package. Now, if you are one of the disturbingly few people who pays close attention to your bill, you will notice it, but then you have to find time to call up, wait on the line, and get it canceled. Save yourself the hassle and unless it’s something you really care about, ask for it to be nixed immediately. Just remember people, there really is no such thing as a free lunch, and the cell phone companies are usually on the better end of that deal.

8.  You may be charged a fee for calling 911. This is actually not due to your cell phone provider, but it does mean you are taking a much sterner look at your taxes and fees than most cell phone companies feel comfortable with. This fee is instituted by your state or town, and the only way you can have this repealed is if you write to your representation about it. While the fee does not actually charge someone in the event of an emergency, it is a charge applied to all phone users in a given area and the money culled from that goes to additional town and state funds, expressly for the purpose of funding call centers. The amount varies, and many people find this charge sneaky and unethical. More information on a state by state basis is available here.

9. You deserve an explanation for every fee on your bill, and getting one may save you money. Every year American’s spend almost $1000 in hidden fees. Here, the Federal Communications Commission breaks down every fee on your bill and tells you where it goes to, including the FCC tax, which is often misleadingly labeled because, as the site says, it does not go to the FCC, the US Treasury, or anywhere but your cell phone company’s pockets. Set aside some time and go through your phone bill line by line, checking every fee and charge to see if it’s legitimate. If there is something you don’t understand, don’t hesitate to call up your company and ask for an explanation.

10.  The FCC has capped out the subscriber line charge at $6.50. This is fixed and finite, and applies to each single line as opposed to an entire account. You can see their policy here. Make sure your company isn’t charging you more than that, because it’s illegal, and while you’re at it, revert to number nine and demand an explanation! (Flickr: benbrown)

No one is more geeky then the crew here at Cell Phones.org, and there are a bunch of geek blogs out there that we love to read. We were curious which of these blogs have the biggest audience, so we decided that we would objectively measure the results.

Data was compiled from three sources:

1. Google PageRank
2. Alexa Traffic
3. Technorati Authority

We then took these scores, created a baseline (see our methodology below), and created our own Geek Rank™.

Top 25 Blogs by Geek Rank

Rank	Site	Google Page Rank	Alexa Rank	Technorati Rank	Geek Rank™
1	Geekologie	6	10	10	26
2	Chris Pirillo	6	8	9	23
3	Laughing Squid	7	3	10	20
4	Geek Dad	7	1	10	18
5	Red Ferret	4	6	6	16
6	Roger Meike’s Blog	5	10	1	16
7	Tech Blog	6	10	0	16
8	How to Geek	4	9	1	14
9	Geeks Are Sexy	5	2	6	13
10	The Geek	4	9	0	13
11	The Raw Feed	6	2	4	12
12	Geek News	5	1	6	12
13	Geeks of Doom	4	3	4	11
14	Geek Style	3	8	0	11
15	Forever Geek	3	5	2	10
16	Geeks Make Me Hot	6	1	2	9
17	Girly GeekDom	6	1	1	8
18	Geek Parenting	6	1	1	8
19	Librarians Matter	5	1	1	7
20	Protocolostomy	5	1	1	7
21	Geek Estate Blog	4	1	1	6
22	Two Mad Geeks	4	1	1	6
23	Thwack	4	1	1	6
24	Geek Practitioners	4	1	1	6
25	Girl Developer	3	1	1	5

Methodology:

To qualify, a blog first had to appear on the first 10 pages of a Google Search for Geek Blogs, be recommended to us by one of our readers, or already be in our feed readers.

We then took data from Google Page Rank, Alexa Traffic and Technorati Authority to form Geek Rank. Alexa Traffic and Technorati Authority our normalized and brought down to a scale relative to PageRank, so that they could be added equally.

For blogs with no Page Rank, Alexa Rank or Authority Rank, a 0 was scored in that category.

For ties (and there were a few), Editor’s discretion prevailed.