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Document Command Incorporated offers Remote Control Mail (changed to Earth Class Mail somewhere around September 10, 2007), a service that will scan your US Mail so you can read it online. For $19.95 a month, the outside of each piece of mail you have directed to their mailing center will be scanned and posted to a website. You can then elect to have the contents scanned, shredded, recycled or mailed to you. This is certainly a boon for those who spend a lot of time away from home.

Their site also lists some services they plan to offer in the future that will make Remote Control Mail all the more valuable. Their NoLook Mail service will allow people to define rules based on the sender, Unmailme will remove addresses from mailing lists and their fax service will send scanned images to a fax machine.

I wonder if someone at the USPS is wondering why they didn’t think of this idea?

via slashdot

This is the second in a series about Getting Things Done with Outlook.

My Calendar setup is standard, no tweaks. It is all in how I use it, and I do use it quite a bit. There are several types of items that I put on the calendar of which only one is a traditional appointment:

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Joe Sixpack is happy about the long trend of restaurants taking beer more seriously, but unhappy about one thing: The Beer Sommelier. He doesn’t think having a person at a restaurant dedicated to the selection of beers is a bad thing, he just takes exception to the sommelier title. As an alternative, he puts forth a much more worthy title: Cellerman or Cellerwoman as the case may be.

via slashfood

New York City’s 311 service has been around since 2003. Today, I finally had reason to use it.

The traffic light at 8th and 39th is quite out of sync with the other lights on 8th Avenue. This causes the traffic on 8th to back up, more than usual anyway. So, I rang up 311 and my call was answered promptly by a friendly operator. She was able to quickly find the right agency to talk to about the situation. I was transferred to the DOT specialist who quickly took the information. I was told that someone should respond within 2 hours. I’ll monitor the situation closely…

Update: A day later, the lights are synced again. Whether or not my call to 311 made a difference, I’ll never know.

Podlinez will play the most recent episode of any podcast on any phone. Each podcast is assigned a phone number. When it is dialed, the podcast starts playing after a short announcement. Nice work, if anyone from Podlinez happens to be reading, here are a few unsolicited feature requests:

• A searchable directory. 15 pages of podcasts are a lot to sort through. One should not have to enter the full feed URL of the podcast on the home page to see if it is already listed either.
• A mobile accessible directory. Podlinz will really shine when one has some time to kill while not near a computer. An optimized site for mobile browsers, some form of search that uses SMS or even a audio directory would be great.
• Keep more than just the last episode of a podcast on hand.

Good luck!

via Lifehacker

Hitchsters, a new airport ride sharing site, launched today for New York City. The free service offers to help people find a suitable fellow passenger to share a cab to or from the airport. Just go to the site, put in your travel details and, if a match is found, each party will receive a text message so the travelers can work out the details.

Their site also mentions the eco-friendly benefit of sharing. Unfortunately, sharing a ride to the airport will do little to offset the amount of jet exhaust that will be injected directly into the atmosphere during your flight. But, every little bit counts right? So, don’t forget that Airtrain, is also available to JFK or Newark.

This sign greets motorists that have just traveled through the new traffic pattern in Times Square. Its great that the city has labeled this the “Times Square Shuffle” as opposed to something more ordinary like “Downtown Detour” or some such. Perhaps this is an harbinger of other traffic sign labeling practices. If so, I recommend prefacing all the pedestrian and cycle directional signs around the Manhattan side of the Williamsburg bridge with “Delancey Dash”.

The smart playlist feature is often overlooked by the casual iTunes user. 43 Folders has a few playlist tricks that make building “music only” playlists a snap. I find the star rating feature to be invaluable. Shuffle mode is great, but any library is likely to have a certain amount of cruft. By rating enjoyable songs, smart playlists can shuffle using only the good stuff. Remember, one can change ratings on their iPod and it will be synced in iTunes.

Here’s a good roundup of email tips from Particletree. Unlike my tips from last month, most of these have to do with the content of the email rather than how one organizes the messages. If you read only one thing from this roundup, be sure to check out A Beginner’s Guide to Effective Email. This was written in 1994; most of the information is as relevant today as it was then.

via 43 Folders

Since the holiday buying season is fast approaching, I thought I would point out this handy NOMAD portable silverware set. Sure, this link made the rounds way back in July, but who’s going to buy silverware that they can hang around their neck for themselves? Right, no one. This is a product made for giving. Now, order up a couple traveling silverware sets of for that special chowhound in your life.