Site recommendation: The Wirecutter

This isn’t always the case but it nearly is. And it’s worth trying every single time. If you want to buy some new computer or other hardware but you don’t know what’s the best thing to get, go to The Wirecutter.

It just tells you. This is the best – and why. This is the best for that budget, this is the best at this or that. It’s very straight and straightforward so the only problem I’ve found is that it’s American. If you’re visiting it from the UK as I am, the site recognises that and offers to swap all the links to be Amazon.co.uk instead of Amazon.com. That’s very smart and nicely done.

But sometimes you’ll find things it recommends just aren’t available here. So it’s not a guaranteed route to get everything, but for narrowing choices, for seeing what options there are, for judging what features are worth what to you, it’s good. For the many times when it does have exactly what you need and you can get it here, it’s excellent.

Working for yourself is harder and better than you think

Lifehacker has a smart post about what it's really like when you go work for yourself. Some of the details are very USA-specific – naturally, since Lifehacker is an American site – but the principles are the same here in the UK:

Often, people want to freelance or start their own business because they're lured by the freedom of working from home. If that's what you care most about, you're probably better off trying to convince your boss to let you telecommute and learning about the downsides of working from home rather than leaving your employer to work for yourself.

List articles – 5 things to eat, 10 things to sell or whatever – are usually quite lazy pieces of writing that are also pointlessly empty. And I'll give you seven reasons why. But this one is simple and straight and practical: I'm not sure I've ever read it all put so well as Lifehacker does.

I've been freelance since the mid-1990s but I also had an enormous crutch of a regular client for a dozen years so I felt I eased into this life. Can't imagine going back now, but I can imagine doing this freelancing an awful lot better: when you've read that article, follow its many links out to further advice. It's a smart collection.

Really excellent news for 3 UK users

The company’s announced free text and data for UK users travelling around the States. I’ve just come back from California and they’re right: my iPhone usage had to drop like a stone for fear of the bill.

I was once lost in France for ten minutes – er, I didn’t just teleport there and get confused, it was the last ten minutes of a trip – and using Google Maps on my phone tripled my bill for the month.

So I love this news. I’m especially pleased because I’m on 3 but it’s great news all round because you know, you just know that other carriers will follow

Details on Cult of Android here:
http://www.cultofandroid.com/46724/three-u-k-to-give-customers-free-calls-texts-data-while-theyre-in-the-u-s/