Crave

Whenever you hear "Wah-wah-wah," you know you've got mail from Dave.

You've already got individual ringtones set up for your boss, your spouse, and other important people. MailTones brings that same concept to e-mail, playing custom sounds when you receive messages from those certain special senders.

Using the $2.99 app [iTunes link] requires two things: That your iPhone is configured for push e-mail (fetched automatically, not manually) and that your e-mail server has the option of forwarding copies of new messages to another address.

Gmail, for example, makes this a snap, as does MobileMe. As for other services and servers, well, you'll have to find out if forwarding is an option. If not, this isn't the app for you.

With that single step completed, however, all that remains is to configure MailTones' alerts, which offer three options.

Friend Matching works like call-based ringtones: You get an alert when you receive mail from a specific person. (However, you can't just enter someone's e-mail address; you have to choose someone already in your address book. Minor gripe.)

Subject Matching sounds an alert when the subject line contains one or more keywords. And Domain Matching targets mail from specific domains (like, say, the office).

For each match you set up, you can choose from 25 available tones, which range from short, simple "dingtones" (my word) to boisterous cowbells, ship horns, and fire sirens.

Suffice it to say, most people get a lot more e-mail than they do phone calls, and it's easy to experience alert overload. Consequently, you'll almost certainly want to set the New Mail tone to "Ignore" so you don't get interrupted every 10 seconds.

At the same time, turn on Show Alerts, which provides a text message-like pop-up (with the sender's name and subject line) along with the audio alert. That way you'll know if the message is important enough to warrant a full-on visit to Mail.

MailTones is an idea whose time has come. If you're tired of pulling out your iPhone every five minutes to see if that new message is something important, now you've got an audio-cue alternative. Indeed, for anyone inundated by e-mail, MailTones is $2.99 well spent.

An AppleInsider report cites an anonymous tip claiming Apple and AT&T may be working on two enhancements for the iPhone specific to AT&T's network:

• Overage alerts would notify users via push notification badges, messages, or sounds when they approach their monthly anytime minutes limit.
• New voice mail options would let users disable the custom voice mail greeting (including AT&T's standard voice mail introduction) and allow them to skip greetings (standard or otherwise) or other automated instructions when calling other AT&T customers.

Unfortunately, the tipster mentioned no warnings from AT&T for overages in other services such as text messaging, international calling, or international data plans. The voice mail options sound like AT&T's answer to David Pogue's Take Back the Beep Campaign.

Would you find these enhancements useful? Would additional warnings for international calling plans help prevent overages that are known to get rather expensive? Let us know in the comments.

If you think the biggest problem with a camera phone is the poor quality of the photos, a member of Congress might make you think again. Earlier this month, Rep. Pete King (R-N.Y.) introduced a bill in the House of Representatives that would ban camera phones from having a silent mode when taking a picture.

The Camera Phone Predator Alert Act (H.R. 414) would "require any mobile phone containing a digital camera to sound a tone whenever a photograph is taken." What's more, the bill would prohibit such handsets from being equipped with a means of disabling or silencing the tone. Enforcement would be through the Consumer Product Safety Commission.

The text of the bill is short, and King's office has not released any public statements. Yet, the reasoning behind the legislation is clear. The text states that "Congress finds that children and adolescents have been exploited by photographs taken in dressing rooms and public places with the use of a camera phone."

At the time of this writing the bill has been referred to the House Energy and Commerce. The Camera Phone Predator Alert Act has no co-sponsors.

On this episode of "When Laser Printers Attack," it turns out your laser printer is not guilty of releasing noxious particles into the air, as previously reported by this Australian health alert (PDF) last year. The report claimed that some laser printers sporadically spew certain "toner-like" particles that pose the same amount of health hazard as cigarettes. As it turns out, laser printers hardly release any of these noxious chemicals into the air and it's perfectly safe to use one without wearing a Hazmat suit.

The good scientists at the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft applied research institute just released this research study that empirically refutes the argument made by the Australians. It states that that "contrary to numerous reports, laser printers release hardly any particles of toner into the air."

The particles are actually made of volatile organic-chemical substances, or VOCs, and while they do confirm that they exist, the VOCs aren't nearly as deadly as a cigarette; in fact, the accused printer perpetrators emit the same level of VOCs as the common toaster, and nobody's keeling over trying to make toast in the morning, so it's safe to assume that your printer is probably not going to be your cause of death. The article goes on to dispel the myth of VOC filters: "As the ultra-fine particles are not emitted from a specific part of the printer, but also from the paper output, for instance, a filter can only have a limited effect."

Lesson learned: use your laser printer with peace of mind; don't lick the toner cartridge; and take solace knowing that everything around us emits some form of small particle/gas/radiation/carcinogen, but only a handful of it is toxic. I think.

SAN DIEGO--We all have very busy lives and a big part of that is trying to manage a steady flow of new information.

Here at DemoFall today, Alerts.com unveiled its new intelligent alerts delivery dashboard.

The idea is that users can pick and choose Web sites on which to set up alerts and then aggregate them all on the Alerts.com site for delivery to whatever devices they want.

For example, if you're looking for an apartment and want to use Craigslist to find it, you can sign up for an alert directly through Alerts.com--instead of having to set it up on Craigslist itself--and then select where and how you want the alert delivered.

The same is true for dozens of other Web sites in many different categories, such as entertainment, sports, news and so on.

Once all the alerts are set up, you can use a pretty simple dashboard to organize and control them all. The dashboard shows a list of all the alerts, how the information from them is to be delivered and an easy on/off switch.

(Credit: Boys Stuff)

After dismissing the concept behind the "BlueQ" wristband alert last year, we were immediately lambasted by readers. (Something that's become all too familiar for some of us.) So we proceed with due caution in passing along this similar product.

The "BluAlert Vibrating Bluetooth Wristband" works on the same principle as the BlueQ: Both are wearable devices that discreetly and wirelessly alert you when you get a call while the phone is in your bag or purse with the ringer turned off, according to 7Gadgets. We do appreciate that this new version at least attempts to look like something other than a sweat band.

At the same time, you may not want to wear one during a job interview. Your prospective employer might think you were on a break from house arrest.

(Credit: KoogaPet)

Depending on where you live, lost kids (and adults) aren't the only ones who could use the occasional aid of an identification device. In San Francisco, for example, it's been widely reported that dogs outnumber children.

And with about 10 million pets expected to get lost each year, technologies like "KoogaPet" will become an increasingly common sight. Though far from the only digital dog tag on the market, the KoogaPet is much smaller than others and holds more data.

The $30 dime-sized tag, which is waterproof and comes in various colors, can store information transferred from the computer through its USB connection. To take full advantage of the device, however, the company offers a 24/7 service for another $1.99 a month that would "retrieve the pet's information from the company's database, contact the owner, and send immediate alerts with pictures to shelters and veterinarians within a 10-mile radius of the pet's home." We still think that such devices would be infinitely more effective if they were combined with some kind of GPS or other tracking technology, but it's at least a start.

(Credit: Smarthome)

We've seen all kinds of innovative concepts lately from car manufacturers trying to prevent people from falling asleep at the wheel. From Infiniti's Lane Departure Warning system to BMW's vibrating steering wheel to Volvo's coffee-break notification system, these optional systems use all kinds of technology to keep drivers conscious, but they nearly always come as part of pricey technology package. Fortunately, it turns out there is a budget option for those wanting to stay awake at the wheel in the form of the Drive Alert Master. This $15 device hooks around a driver's ear in a similar way to a Bluetooth headset and relies on a tilt sensor to detect when the driver's head is nodding. When a nod is detected, the system emits a shrill, powerful beep to bring you back to your senses. The activation angle can be adjusted from 15 to 30 degrees, depending on the angle at which you nod off. According to Smarthome.com, a retailer of the device, the Drive Alert Master can be worn "when watching movies at home, during early morning classes, or while attending all-day meetings."

We suggest you check out this comical video from the Detroit Free Press' technology correspondent before you buy one, though, as it appears that a 30-degree nod might be more than enough to get you into trouble on the freeway.

Via: Detroit Free Press

(Credit: The Gadget Blog)

Being of a somewhat fastidious nature here at Crave, we've been delighted to see such advances in hand-cleaning systems as touchless faucets for the home and Dyson's "Airblade" hand-drying machine. There's just one minor complication: They work only if people use them.

That's where the "Speechpod" comes in. It's sort of a surrogate mom, always at the ready to nag us to wash our hands when its sensors detect a human in the vicinity, according to the Gadget Blog.

At present it's designated only for medical facilities, which reportedly have ordered nearly 500 Speechpods from its Scottish manufacturer. But we're already scheming to figure out a way to get one for our kids.