I owe a significant amount of my digital photography knowledge and skills to what I’ve learned from the abundance of digital photography sites with free tutorials on the Internet. Sure there’s lots of photography equipment you can purchase and courses you can take, but there’s lots of material produced by veteran photographers in the field to help you produce quality photographs that won’t cost you a dime.

This article is a follow-up to another MakeUseOf introduction to 5 Websites to Learn a Lot More About Photography and DigiCams.

The Bulow Creek canoe trail meanders through salt marshes and oak hammocks from the old sugar plantation down to the Intracoastal Waterway at Highbridge Road. Visit the Bulow Plantation park site at http://www.floridastateparks.org/bulowplantation/default.cfm for more information.

Historic City Memories: D. P. Davis - Part I

December 16, 2009

The Mysterious Disappearance of D.P. Davis

Part I of a series
D. P. Davis Comes to St. Augustine

By Geoff Dobson

Geoff Dobson writes about D.P. Davis - as in Davis Shores - in this 4-part series at Historic City News.

The new interface has been designed to replicate a traditional car dashboard, but everything is interconnected. There are two 4.2″ LCD screens on either side of an analog speedometer, plus an 8″ touch-screen LCD in the center console. Controls on either side of the steering heel make it easy to navigate different options.

---

More Features

---

Here are some other features that MyFord Touch, powered by SYNC will include:

Media Hub
Additional USB port for a total of two USB 2.0 inputs
SD Card slot
RCA A/V input jacks

Internet Connectivity
Full WiFi capability including Internet “hot spot” connectivity and a built-in browser for use while in “Park” (late availability)
Integrated browser supports tabbed page navigation, “drag” to pan and scroll and a provides a 3-D carousel for bookmark browsing
Support for on-screen and USB-connected keyboards
RSS feed aggregator and text-to-voice reader
Mobile in-car WiFi “hot spot” capability through USB-installed air card or USB mobile broadband modem

Audio
AM/FM/CD, SIRIUS/XM satellite radio, USB-connected MP3 players and memory sticks
New HD Radio capability
Song () tagging capability via HD Radio Technology, allowing listeners to identify song information and store it for later use
Browse tracks by artist, scan lists of tracks with identical names, and browse through devices without having to change audio sources
-D carousel album cover art and photo viewing displays allow easy scanning of available material, especially combined with Gracenote Media Management
Media player equipped with new “Podcast” source category
Enhanced Bluetooth® audio support including metadata, which allows additional command and control functions for capable mobile devices

What’s really cool is that Ford will be making built-in vehicle navigation a standard feature on MyFord SYNC vehicles. Navigation support is built-into the main Windows-embedded powered console and using an SD card, users can easily upgrade mapping and other data, without having to rely on DVDs or hardware upgrades.

So, I plug my DataJack into the dashboard and everyone in the car has Internet access? What's really nice is that this is going into the "normal people cars" as well as the "rich people" ones.

The “scientific consensus” that has held sway for four decades regarding both exposure to the sun and vitamin D has collapsed. What has emerged in place of the old “settled science” is the knowledge that most people in America are seriously vitamin D deficient or insufficient. The same is true for Canada and Europe, and the implications are staggering.

Simply put, unless you are one of the few people with optimal serum D levels, such as lifeguards and roofers in South Florida, you can cut your risks from most major diseases by 50 to 80 percent. All you have to do is get enough D. It also means we can significantly reduce both health care costs and the staggering national deficit by taking a few simple steps.

The trick, when looking at the new withholding tax tables for 2010 as compared to post-stimulus 2009, buries an increase in federal withholding taxes–for all income categories–basically giving the government an interest-free loan until current year taxes are filed next year. Some would blame the increase in withholding on the Making Work Pay tax credit being spread out over 12 months as compared to 2009, which was only over 9 months, but this would be impossible as some middle class wage categories carry an increase in the withholding tax of over $200 per pay period.

Unlike the middle class wage earners, who are going to see huge amounts taken out of their paychecks, unless they increase their exemptions on their W4 form, it’s an increase that most wouldn’t even notice–$10 or $20 in some cases. Here are some of the “highlights” of the new 2010 withholding tables:

Award winning war correspondent Michael Yon was detained and handcuffed at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport Yesterday by Transportation Security Administration (TSA) personnel.

Yon was returning to the United States from Hong Kong to visit family when TSA officials stopped him during a routine security checkpoint.  “Officials asked me what was in my bag—nothing wrong with this question,” Yon said in an interview with BigGovernment.com.  “I told them it was normal stuff, clothes and toothbrushes.”

At this point the TSA officials escorted Yon to a designated screening area where they examined the contents of his bag.  “Then they asked me how much money I make,” Yon said.  Yon suggested to the TSA officials that the question was inappropriate and unrelated to transportation security.  The award-winning blogger noted another TSA officer approached Yon: “he asked who do I work for.”  ”I did not answer the question which clearly was upsetting to the TSA officers.”

There's no excuse for this.