As everyone looks to pinch pennies and save money, this offer will undoubtedly catch more than just a few eyeballs and the offer will run through till Dec. 20, a time when Wal-Mart says it will reconsider the offer and perhaps extend the free shipping offered on the Wal-Mart online stores to several other products. Everyone wants the heart and money of a customer and they’re all trying to save every penny that they can . To say that it is an insanely competitive offer would be an understatement; it’s the kind of offer that will have other other online retailers running worried since they will have to match up to it in one way or another. There’s no way they can avoid reacting to this one piece of info because if they do, it will mean they get left behind in the race for dollars this holiday season.

It is a surprise move on Wal-Mart’s part, but it will perhaps be even more surprising for the common man to know that prices were pretty much the main dilemma for online retailers even before this holiday season commenced. Cost-consciousness seems to be the new mantra of retailers everywhere and Target and J.C. Penney had already announced their own subsidized shipping programs, the most aggressive ever in their respective histories. In the wake of that, Sears, Toys R Us and Williams Sonoma followed suit as they all follow the path of elusive riches and much success as made so popular by online retailer Amazon, a behemoth in the field. Amazon’s shipping program has been an incredible success, and many others are offering unlimited two day shipping in exchange for an annual fee.

But Wal-Mart is Wal-Mart, and their scale and sheer influence cannot be understated or underestimated. If this were a comic book universe, Wal-Mart would be Galactus, devourer of planets and all-round bad-ass who doesn’t so much as blink before putting an end to entire races. But this new gambit by Wal-Mart changes the game. Its free pass for shipping sets a new benchmark in e-commerce that everyone else will have to aspire to. It is, for better or worse, the new gold standard of shipping. Free shipping will expand the customer base of the Wal-Mart online store since its free shipping is available without even stepping out of the house and without even making a minimum purchase. JC Penney and Sears and the like will get by just fine. But what of the small online retailer? Wal-Mart will crush his hopes and dreams heartlessly underfoot. And so the juggernaut that is Wal-Mart rolls on.

Antenna

Gorgeous stainless steel casing that gives iPhone an elegant look also serves as the antenna. Besides, external antenna, along with giving it an ultra-thin look, was supposed to enhance the phone’s signal strength, as mentioned by Steve Jobs.

And he is absolutely right. The new antenna’s connectivity has been significantly improved, only if you don’t hold the phone with your left hand.

When your palm touches the antenna, your skin brings minute gap between two antennas, causes it to loose its connectivity. This glitch was taken so seriously that Consumer Reports simply refused to recommend this phone until the antenna problem was fixed.

Most users don’t really have any trouble keeping the gap between their left palm and the phone, and are surprisingly thrilled with its connectivity strength. However, many people residing in low-network area, and the ones who cannot mind the gap, are constantly complaining about its poor reception. If you are searching for an inexpensive method to fix the problem, you can use a duct tape or a rubber band to keep the two antennas connected.

Immediately after a damning review by Consumer Report, Steve Jobs promised to provide free iPhone cases to all iPhone 4 buyers, and refund to those who have bought cases already.

The ‘Surprise’ Element

In response to its connectivity problem, Apple said it’s a major software glitch, which has been persistent since the original iPhone. For more than 3 years now, iPhones have been displaying 2 additional bars than it actually should.

When this issue was addressed in public, Apple decided to admit their mistake openly and said they were surprised to know about the reception problem, and they formula they had adopted to calculate signal bars was completely wrong.

Proximity Hang-Up

Dropped calls have always been an issue with iPhones. Initially, it was AT&T. Later, it was due to death grip. And now, it’s your cheek. But this shouldn’t happen.

Almost every smart phone is equipped with proximity sensor that senses if your ear comes closer to the phone while answering the call. Even iPhone has such sensor that keeps you from accidentally touching the ‘hold’, ‘end’, or ‘mute’ button.

However, many users have been complaining about poor functioning of the sensor that, accidentally, causes users to dial number while still on call, or simply drop the call. More than 2,000 complaints have been posted on online forum credit by Apple on its website.

In response, Apple said it’s working to solve the issue, and will come up with a software update very soon.

White iPhone

White gadgets were considered obsolete until recently when white iPhone were suddenly unavailable due to major glitches. Due to less production, the demand has risen, and now everyone wants it.

When the new iPhone was launched in June, only black instruments were available. It weren’t available even a month later. In response, Apple said ‘producing white phones is far more challenging than expected’. However, they said it would be available after second half of July.

Yellow Dots

Fortunately, this problem dried up on its own. Initially, when iPhone 4 was launched, many yellow bars and spots appeared on the screen frequently. However, as soon as customers reported this problem, it simply faded away, without sending the phone for fixing the glitch.

Experts believe it wasn’t magic. It was simply the glue that was used to attach the body to the screen. This happened because Apple manufactured and shipped the phone very quickly, without letting the glue dry away.

If you decide to buy iPhone 4, be ready to face these problems, or some other ones that may just come up.

Budget software definitely helps to make the process simpler. However, this is after assuming you are proficient at both: Using such software and budgeting. But, this isn’t the case with most people. Most applications are difficult to use; besides, they are costly too. Instead, you can use Google Docs for your personal budgeting.

Why Should You Use Google Docs to Manage Your Budget?

1.    Customization
With the help of Google Docs, you can customize your budget spreadsheet. Whether it’s a complicated budget you want or a simple spreadsheet, you can get it done easily on Google Docs. What else, you can its change colors, fonts, format, and structure as well.

2.    Simple
It provides an efficient personal budgeting tool without killing the simplicity of it. This is probably the biggest advantage of using Google Docs as a budgeting tool. Most software applications available in the market are complicated. This is probably the best substitute available today.

3.    Easy Access from Anywhere
Since the application is online, you don’t have to bother about its accessibility, if you are away from your house. You can access it from any part of the world (except for China), provided you have a computer and an internet connection. So, you budget is always with you, wherever you go.

Check Register

Some software are linked with your bank account to register your transactions. Sometimes, that is all you may need to get your finances back on track. This kind of software is very basic and it has several limitations.

This is not much different from online banking, which too keeps a track of your transactions and can be accessed from anywhere. Besides, check registers wouldn’t help you to reduce your debt or keep a track of your expenses made in cash or other modes of payment. So, if you are planning to use free personal finance software and if you notice ‘check’ in the title, remind yourself about the limitations it has.

Spreadsheets

Some personal finance software has a spreadsheet with built-in calculation functions. You too can prepare such spreadsheet at home. However, if you have such facility available on the web without any cost, why not use it. This software simply helps individuals to keep a track of their funds i.e. where did the money come from and where is it going.

People are scared of budget; another trait I have noticed lately. There is nothing to worry about. If you don’t know how to get started or it seems difficult, my article is here to help you, if not me.

Before we get started with 5 simple tips on budgeting, I would request you to jot down fixed monthly expenses like rentals, mortgage, car payments, insurance, and so on. Next, list down how much money you utilize in a month, including all bill payments, shopping, habits, and so on.

Once we have this information in place, we will get started with setting up a proper budget plan. You can have it your way, any way you like, but don’t ignore these 5 tips on budgeting.

1. Keep aside certain amount for emergencies. There are several unexpected costs you may have to incur. Plan for this amount in your budget
2. Have the right attitude. Don’t get disappointed with minor losses or unexpected changes in your budget. Most important thing is to never give up.
3. Keep a track of where the money is going, and where it is coming from. Have a record of each penny you spend.
4. Try to be frugal in order to save some money every month. But make sure you don’t deprive yourself of basic needs.
5. Keep learning new methods of budgeting. Don’t have a complicated budget right from the beginning. Start with a simple plan. Gradually, learn more techniques. Several tips on budgeting can be found online. Make use of them.

However, it’s not easy these days as well, with so many convenient tools to manage. Instead of bringing ease and comfort in one’s life, the modern financial life has caused additional headache in our lives. Having personal finance software is one of the best ways to eradicate this headache and manage our finances properly.

There is a huge variety of personal finance software available today, each catering to different needs. Amongst them, the simplest one is the bank account software that keeps track of all your bank account transactions, including credit cards. If you want a comprehensive tool, there are softwares that manage your investments, tax payments, electronic banking, budget analysis, and many other things that include almost every element of personal finance.

The best ones available in the market are Microsoft Money and Quicken by Intuit Corporation. They have several softwares, including the above two applications. These personal finance software provide you the ease of managing your money without physically involving in the transaction. Every bit can be accessed and performed online. Once you start using it, you would never wonder where all your money went. It’s worth a try.

1.    Don’t Reveal your Social Security Number

Do not carry your Social Security card with you everywhere you go. Instead, try to remember the number. This will lower your risk of identity theft.

2.    Don’t reveal Personal Information without Caution

We do this especially on the web. Many sites asks for our personal information and we give it out without second thought. Do not do this. Whenever a website, or someone over the phone, asks for your personal information, do not reveal it unless it’s trustworthy.

3.    Trash For You May Be Treasure For Thieves

This is one of the most important identity theft protection tips. One must not through away papers, cds, or any other items that contain personal information without shredding or destroying. This is a safe habit to adopt.

4.    Mail Service

Check your mailbox daily. Do not keep mails for long. Besides, when you are out of time, discontinue mail delivery service. This will help you to keep your mails safe.

5.    Keep a Regular Check on your Bills and Statements

Don’t just throw away your bills and statements. Check them regularly for any unauthorized withdrawals or any such unexpected changes. If you don’t receive bills on time, call up the service provider and ask the reason for such inconvenience. Chances are someone might have changed your mailing address to hide fraudulent charges.

6.    Keep a Regular Check on Your Credit Report

Any discrepancies in your payments would affect your credit score. Hence, check your report regularly, or at least review it once a year.

7.    Be a Smart PC User

Be smart while creating passwords. Don’t make it easier for thieves to hack it. Install latest antivirus, anti spyware, and firewall in your computer and update it regularly. If you download some content or software from the web, make sure you have read the terms and conditions. Do not reply spam emails, or click on pop up ads.

8.    Ask Questions

If someone asks for your personal information, don’t be afraid to ask questions. Ask why they want the information, how it would be used, and know the confidentiality policy. If the answers aren’t satisfactory, refuse to reveal any personal information.

These identity theft protection tips would help your to minimize your risk and keep your personal information secure. However, any negligence from your side can cast you everything you own. Hence, be smart, be safe, always.

Every card has a unique number. These are, however, not generated through a random unique number generation machine. The US follows a simple mathematical formula to do this.

Luhn Algorithm

Hans Peter Luhn, in 1954, when the world wasn’t absorbed by the credit card debt, introduced an algorithm that’s famously known as Luhn Algorithm. And this method is used by the government of America to generate credit and debit card numbers without errors. And if you don’t believe I am about to reveal the secret, pull out any card from your wallet and follow this process.

Here is an example. Take a set of four 4 digits like: 5183 4598 9852 5524

Now, start from left corner and double the first digit and every other digit in the sequence. This will result in something like this:
(10)1(16)3 (8)5(18)8 (18)8(10)2 (10)5(4)4

Now, add all the double digit number (in brackets) in the sequence.

1173 8598 9812 1544

Now, when we add all these digits they sum up to 76, which means this credit card number is not a legitimate one because every legitimate credit or debit card umber can be divisible by 10. You have a card, don’t you? Add all the digits and I am sure it would be 50 or 60 or any other number divisible by 10. So, you can take a random set of 16 digits; do this process over and over again until you get a number divisible by 10. If you are, however, able to successfully create a legitimate number, you cannot use it to shop or do anything with the number. Why? Because Luhn is very smart and he hasn’t publicly revealed the secret of how to generate the CID, CVC2, and CVV2 numbers that are on the face and rear portion of the card.

With this process you can easily create fake credit card numbers. But duplicating the other security codes is just impossible. This is because CVV2 code is created with the help of account number, expiry date of the card, the three digit unique service code, and DES keys. It is not generated with just a single piece of information. Even if you are able to get these numbers, the combination involved to generate the security code is far too complex than the above method. Hence, generating a CVV2 code becomes highly unattainable.

Though the involvement of complex procedure to establish a legitimate credit card security number is quite tough and may disappoint few users, most of us should be happy as it becomes quite impossible for hackers and fraudsters to duplicate your information.

Talking about stampedes, let me tell you that the scene is not expected to be all that out of control at some malls. You need not bother about getting injured as the malls have taken special safety measures. Especially since a store worker was tramped to death last year on Black Friday. Most stores are having the double line queue system and that means you’ve got to wait for long hours. Some shoppers intend to reach their favorite stores as early as 3 A.M! Can you beat that?

After coming to know about Black Friday stampede and rush, many of us will back out of the plans to venture out for shopping on Black Friday. But if you’ve still got unflinching enthusiasm for a Black Friday shopping spree, let me caution you that see to it that your effort is well paid.  Don’t get carried away by advertisements too much. Many a time, you get to see that the items that are offered on huge discounts are more often old stock or less popular brands. After all, the pains that you take to get a good gift for your beloved should be paid off well, isn’t it? So why not go online? That will save you the trouble of standing in long queues, for long hours and turning up with something not quite good.

Amongst the best deals that you can actually think of here are three stores/brands that you can most probably think of visiting to get goods worth your hard-earned money and efforts.

• Apple has a Black Friday sales which you can check out on their websites. Visit some good tech blogs where you can get information on huge discounts. You can expect to get up to 30 % discount on computers.
• Why don’t you go for a 42 inch HDTV plasma or LCD TV? This is the time you’ll get them at highly competitive prices.
• Go for netbooks which are being offered at good discounts. Go through online consumer reviews to find out more about the deals. Visit websites like Dealnews.com and Retrovo.com for tracking any worthy sales offers.

Slashing Bandwidth

One of the ways in which the ISP might fool you due to increased subscriber usage is to cut your quota of bandwidth during peal hours. They might also cut your bandwidth if you do certain online tasks that they do not approve of. They might promise you a certain bandwidth at the time of registering for the service but they do not live up to the promised amount.

Lower Speeds than Promised

Most internet service providers promise a speed of “upto 10 MBPs”. That’s where the catch lies. The speeds at which you browse the internet is rarely close to the promised 10 MBPs in most cases. For example, in UK the internet surfers don’t even know that they are browsing the internet at speeds lower than half of the speeds mentioned on the information brochure that you get when registering for the service.

Target Advertising

Many ISPs, in order to gain an extra buck from internet advertising, have invaded the privacy of the user by tracking web activity and inserting advertisements that are most relevant to the subjects upon which they surfed the most. For example, Charter which sold the concept under the name of ‘enhancement of online experience of user’. The subscribers were, of course, given the option to regain privacy by downloading a privacy cookie, but the process was more cumbersome than compromising with your privacy.

Web Spying

In 2007, Communication’s Assistance for Law Enforcement Act has made it compulsory for the ISPs to allow the federal authorities to wire tap the internet to keep a track of the user behavior. This is obviously a move in the direction of increasing security but it needs one to thoroughly compromise on his/her security. This Web Spying is not taken in very well by many internet companies and users.

Ads on Error Pages

Many times a website does not load well or is non existent. In such cases, ‘the website not found’ message comes on those pages. Advertisements are placed on those pages by some ISPs to make money from its viewer/subscriber database.

Forging Bandwidths

Some ISPs deliberately interfere with the P2P bandwidth speeds and prevent any downloading from happening. Comcast in 2007 engaged in packet spoofing/forgery by deliberately inserting bogus packets into a P2P file transfer, virtually stopping the entire download process.

Virus/ Spyware Protection Not Adequate

Good ISPs provide adequate virus/spyware protection, but some other service providers are not able to protect the computers of their users from spyware and malware. They do not take the responsibility of paying up for the virus clean up process even though they have committed to protect the subscribers’ computer from viral attack at the time of registration.