money

Farecast, an airline ticket prediction and purchasing service, has launched a new Deals section that helps people find the best prices on tickets within a 90-day window. Unlike the recently launched Fare Guard, the Deals section is completely free and competes with other discount travel sites like TravelZoo and CheapTickets to aggregate flights that sell for a fraction of their typical cost. The service is currently limited to 38 major airports in the United States.

The search results are separated by the best deals, last-minute flights, weekend and weeklong flights, and flights for families. There's also a section for … Read more

Continuing today's theme of ridiculous luxury items is, of all things, a high-performance mouse pad. In what could easily be a parody, BornRich says the English-made "Formula 1 Mouse Mat" was designed with "state-of-the-art automotive 3D modeling software." The carbon-fiber pad has inlaid leather with Italian suede backing and, of course, a prominently embossed "F1" logo. The price for a racetrack-grade mouse pad? It lists for 260 pounds, or about $525. But it comes wrapped in F1 tissue paper, so it's not overpriced or anything.

"Do as I say, not as I do," probably summarizes the financial advice of many parents. Intuit, by contrast, aims for its new, Web-based Quicken Kids & Money to teach young children fiscal discipline while demanding attention from parents in the process. This $99 yearly subscription includes browser-based interfaces for parents and their 5- to 8-year-olds. The time seems ripe for an interactive service like this, given advertisers' colossal efforts to capture the hearts and minds of children along with the wallets of their parents.

Designed for integration into household habits rather than as a babysitting tool, Quicken … Read more

Sure, there are fancy robots out there that can spy, fly and even take your tempurature, but do they care about your financial well-being?

Unlike a lot of those other hot-shot bots, the "Robot Bank" isn't here to show off--it just goes about its business, encouraging you to save for the future and diligently toting up every penny you drop in. Don't try to cheat, either: It recognizes withdrawals and will make disapproving noises if you try to sneak a few bucks.

No matter where we travel, stateside or otherwise, we seem to exude tourist nerdism--which means we're an easy mark for pickpockets and con artists. So even after resorting to dorky money belts and the like, we could still use all the help we can get.

That's why we're so grateful to Tokyomango for pointing out this counterfeit bill detector, which uses ultraviolet rays to scan paper currency for authentication. It was introduced in Japan for that country's universally known camera-toting tourists, but we see no reason the technology should be limited to any particular population. If … Read more

If you're like most Crave readers, we assume that you want all the appropriate accoutrements for the Lamborghini resting comfortably in your garage. (That's what we tell our advertisers, anyway.) So we do our level best to keep you abreast of the latest technologies that bear the family name, such as the just-released "VX2" new generation of Asus laptops.

As the Gadgets Weblog points out, Asus has provided scant details in the specs department, so we don't know how much of an improvement the new version is over its maiden line. But let's face … Read more

While you look back at your personal financial damages and delights from 2006, the time is ripe to consider how to manage money differently in 2007. A handful of new services allow you to track spending and monitor payments and investments online.

There still aren't many independent, Web-based services for handling personal finances. Big vendors tend to take care of that business, as is the case with the leading personal finance applications, Intuit Quicken and Microsoft Money. However, while Intuit offers online backup, there's no way to remotely reach your transactions while away from your main computer (unless … Read more

Clearly, Swarovski crystals have cornered a market in consumer technology. We're not sure what market that is, exactly, but they've cornered it.

There's no disputing this fact with the introduction of these crystal-encrusted headphones, which Cool Hunter says were designed by DJ Donna D'Cruz in a variety of colors (shudder) for a mere $2,500. The phones are the latest to join Swarovski's unfortunately growing collection of mice, phones, laptops and, yes, refrigerators. Who needs a disco ball?

There are a lot of blogs on the Web about saving money, and there's some startlingly good advice from unexpected sources-- such as Dilbert creator Scott Adams. But, there's so much that it's hard to wade through. What most of us need is real advice from other people who are in the same boat as we are. For example, is Amazon Prime worth it? Other Amazon customers would know. But how will you find them? How would you even know to ask them?

A new site, Wesabe, has a creative take on financial advice. It lets you … Read more