move

Like death and taxes, another one of life's inevitabilities is moving. Unless you're a wealthy agoraphobic, chances are you've either done a move all by yourself, or hired outside help. The process for the latter can be expensive, which is where CityMove comes in. The free service lets you post a job for movers who can then offer you a bid, allowing you to choose the best deal if there are multiple offers.

It's the same idea that was popularized with bank loans by LendingTree in the 1990s, although in this case you're the one … Read more

It was bound to happen. With the U.S. government promising truckloads of cash to overhaul the U.S. health care system, while simultaneously making positive noises around open source, it was just a matter of time before someone connected the dots.

That someone appears to be Joanne Rohde, former executive vice president of worldwide operations at Red Hat, who has launched the Axial Project, a stealth-mode start-up that aims to "combin[e] the principles of Open Standards and Open Source...to connect all the parties in the Health ecosystem safely and securely."

It's a big task, … Read more

I'm currently in the process of buying a home, and the big move is looming. To try to improve the process of staying organized and making good choices, I've tracked down a variety of moving-related Web tools.

(If you want to see even more tools, check out this roundup of apps we tried out last year.)

Before the movers come, it's important to stay organized. Get labels for the boxes. Create a checklist, so you don't forget anything. And be prepared.

HomeExpo If you want to attach labels to the boxes around your house, HomeExpo is the way to go. You can choose from a variety of labels and print them for free. The site has labels marked by room. You can even add your own description to labels for miscellaneous items.

Mayflower's checklist The Mayflower moving company has an interactive guide available to anyone who signs up on its site. Included is a checklist that provides you with a full list of things that generally need to be attended to before you move. It reminds you to contact doctors, banks, and service providers, notifying them of the change of address. It also has helpful hints to remember as you start your move. You can even have the site e-mail you weekly reminders up to eight weeks before your move, so you don't forget a step.

Maestro Label Designer The Maestro Label Designer from OnlineLabels.com is the site's online-label design tool. You can add text to labels or add clip-art images for more advanced designs. The tool makes it easy to create labels, but beware that it will cost you $6.95 per month to use it. That said, it does come with a free trial, so you can try it before you decide to subscribe.

OneSimpleMove OneSimpleMove is a fantastic moving tool. Once you sign up for the free site, you're immediately brought to its calendar page. There, you can set your moving day and populate the calendar with tasks. It will even send e-mail reminders to you whenever you have a task to complete.

Besides the calendar, OneSimpleMove has a directory of movers, rental truck companies, supplies firms, and much more. When you input your current place of residence and tell the service where you're moving, it immediately puts together a list of companies that will aid you in your move. When the move is complete, you can write a review on OneSimpleMove of the companies with which you worked. The site says it will donate $20 to your favorite charity when you write that review.… Read more

I'm not a big fan of anything subterranean, but every time I'm in NYC, for practical reasons, I take the subway.

This time around, it was also because I wanted to find out if the City Transit NYC Subway Guide iPhone app was worth $2.99. I ended up catching something else which, by itself, totally made the one-hour ride from Manhattan to the Bronx worthwhile.

As express train No. 5 started to leave 59th Street and Lexington Ave., two dudes who looked just like regular New Yorker-on-holiday riders turned on their boombox. One called out: "Hi everybody, what you're about to see is the most amazing thing. If you don't like it, boo as much as you want. But if you do, clap and please show your support." Seeing some people taking out their cameras, he added, "You can take video all you want, as long as you pay us."

Without further ado, the two took turns performing the most amazing breakdance I've seen. It was just coincidental that I had my iPhone video on and managed to capture the whole thing. What I didn't capture was the fact that their dance inspired some regular riders to stand up and show off their own moves. I totally heart NYC for this. … Read more

I use both Windows and Mac machines at my desk for testing and reviewing software for each platform. While both platforms have their advantages and disadvantages, I recently found a simple program that fixes one of my pet peeves about Windows.

One small Windows XP and Vista interface quirk that has always bothered me is the inability to move items in the taskbar. Though it might not bother other people, I always like having my programs set up in a certain way--Outlook on the left, my browser after that, my chat program, and then other programs to the right of … Read more

After two and a half years of development and a total investment of about $2 million, advertising start-up Big Moving Pictures was just about ready to start signing customers and generating revenue.

Then, in September of 2008, financial disaster struck Wall Street. It was right before the big unveiling of the company's product. BMP's potential customers--large consumer advertisers--lost their budgets. The best contacts at customer companies got laid off. The start-up found itself in a business wasteland. It was ready to go. But its pipeline to revenue had dried up.

It was a disaster for the company, but CEO David Knight (disclosure: a friend) didn't think it meant he had to fold up shop. To his mind, and those of his financial backers, the idea was sound; it's just that the timing had gone bad. Knight found his business in a unique situation that let him execute an unusual business maneuver: he put the company into hibernation.

Knight cut expenses to near-zero, convinced his creditors to cut the company a lot of slack, and stopped angling for new business. It was all to put the firm essentially into deep freeze while he waited for the economy to recover enough to be able to support his business.

BMP's business is placing ultra-large high-resolution video displays at airshows and similar events, and using those displays to show live footage from cameras mounted in and on the vehicles performing at the show (the ability to get permission to mount HD cameras on military aircraft is one of the company's competitive advantages). Wrapped around that unique video are interviews, pre-recorded features, and advertising, the source of BMP's revenues.

Before putting Big Moving Pictures on ice, Knight says he looked at the usual accepted alternatives, including raising money to bridge the recession. He said that would have been both difficult, dilutive to the employee shareholders, and pointless, since there was really nothing of additional value the company could accomplish without customers. He also looked at changing the business model radically into one that didn't rely on advertisers, but did not come up with a concept that made sense (although he is working on some ancillary video productions using his well-placed cameras).

How to put a business into suspended animation When companies start putting money back into advertising experiments, Knight is convinced, his business will again become viable. But as BMP was still pre-revenue before the market crash, he found himself able to simply turn off the lights without actually killing the possibility of turning them back on.

Here's how he did it. … Read more

Charles Schwab improved its online trading platform Tuesday with the introduction of new features for its site, StreetSmart.com. According to the investment firm, clients will now have real-time performance reporting for closed positions, new short-selling tools, and more order types. The app will also feature new tabs for realized gain and loss data and information on shorting securities. The updates are available now on the Schwab service.

Privus Mobile, a company that provides mobile calling services, announced Tuesday that its Caller ID app is now available through Handmark stores, as well as mobile stores that offer apps for Windows … Read more

It adds new functionality to your mouse, there's little to learn, and it's free. AltMove Manager is a mouse and desktop enhancement manager that can move and resize windows that are locked, grab a screenshot, and magnify a window under the mouse. You can easily add a few others through the Actions menu.

As an executable, the app doesn't need to be installed--just run the executable for the shortcuts to be in place. The regular settings include some standard program options for running the executable at start-up and keeping it on top. Advanced settings let you move … Read more

It's fairly easy to use iTunes to get music, photos, and video onto your iPod. But what if you've got a video that you didn't buy on the iTunes Store? Or you want to get those files onto a PSP--or a Nokia phone? How about getting 6-megapixel photos from your camera to your Sony Ericsson Walkman phone? It's for those sort of digital back-and-forths that Nero's created Move it. The new Windows software lets you transfer most digital photos, audio, and video files between a variety of portable devices using your PC as the middleman. … Read more