Free phone calls

Here's a tip for those of you still paying for long distance calls on your home phone or if you have free incoming calls on your cell phone.

http://local.live.com

This website is maintained by microsoft as an alternative to Google Earth; an exceptional alternative, if I might add. If you want to search for a type of business in a certain area just click the name of the business (eg. Home Depot, or Bed and Breakfast) and it will show you all the locations within your current map view. The results that come up are based on Phone Book entries in the area. When you find the business that you want you can view all the listings for it: name, address, phone. As an extra service the site provides you can click "call for free" and put in your phone number. The site will then call the business and you to connect you. The call looks to your phone company as an incomming call and you won't be charged (unless you pay for the minutes anyway).

It's a very cool site if you want to find stuff. I think far more useful than Google Earth, because you don't have to know what you're looking for in advance, and has more detailed arial shots in more areas. The site provides three different views: regular map, satellite map, and (in certain areas) bird's eye view. Bird's eye view is a great feature, they hired pilots to fly by certain areas and take pictures with their camera to get a closer side-type view of the area. Excellent for getting to know your surroundings.

Other features: A Scratchpad to save all your favorite destinations, email your scratchpad to a friend or your blog, nothing extra to install on your computer.