Grrrl Power

Sydney Morning Herald

Saturday June 10, 2006

David Stonehouse

David Stonehouse tries some girlie pop, cleans up his bookmarks and celebrates Apple's 30th.

Music

A rising star among the girlie-pop brigade, Skye Sweetnam (www.skyesweetnam.com) has opened for Britney Spears in North America and Europe, and starred in a TV show, Radio Free Roscoe. You can witness her enthusiasm and rebel lyrics in either the music or video corners of her website. There is far more to select from in video, with a dozen download or streamable choices. The Canadian artist is capturing some attention in Australia, with local fan site (www.ssweetnam.net) and a petition calling for her to tour here (www

.petitiononline.com/ss2a2004/petition.html).

Software

Browser bookmarks can pile up quickly and always with good intentions. You tell yourself, I'll look at the site later. Somehow, you rarely make it back. Even if you aren't an avid bookmarker, somehow they still pile up. And who ever finds the time to clean out their favourites? AM-Deadlink (aignes.com/deadlink.htm) is a tiny utility that does the job for you. It scans through your bookmarks no matter if you use Internet Explorer, Mozilla, Firefox or Opera, identifies the duds and duplicates, then let's you trash them with a couple of clicks. It even has a handy "internal preview" feature that lets you see the site results before deciding what to do with the link. And it's free.

Video

This one is for diehard Apple fans. In celebration of Apple turning 30, tune in to macTV (live.watchmactv.com) - a site that isn't part of the empire Steve Jobs built but is nonetheless all Apple all the time. See Apple commercials, sometimes ones that were obscure or released in overseas or even the odd video potshot at Bill Gates's expense. Episode 125, called Daydream Believer, is a five-minute-plus slick commercial retrospective of the three decades. All of this devotion is free, unless you want to upgrade to the faster downloads of macTV Premier (premier.watchmactv.com) for $2.80 a month. The videocasts of macTV, which began last July, are supposed to be daily episodes but sometimes turn out to be every-other-day or later broadcasts. Oh well, we can wait.

Mobile

Yahoo7 Mobile is offering some of its usual web portal services, such as mail, instant messaging, search and photos, for mobile phones. Wing over to its website (au.mobile.yahoo.com/mweb) to see whether your phone can tap into the available features. Right now, 3 Mobile, 3CDMA, Telstra iMode and Telstra Active customers can enjoy movie, finance and weather downloads from Yahoo7. Data charges could apply.

Handheld

Journal Bar (www.omegaone.com/journalbar) is a plug-in for the daily information screen for Pocket PCs. It compiles a variety of data in a small window, including weather in as many as 14 locations, up to 200 stock listings, news from international sources and sport scores. Update the information on a wireless connection or while your handheld is docked to your PC. Trade your email address for a free trial or buy it for $US30 ($39.50).

icondownloads@gmail.com

© 2006 Sydney Morning Herald

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