NTSB Calls for Ban on Automobile Cell Phone Use
Last year, a government study found that one in 11 U.S. traffic deaths were caused by distracted driving.
And one of the biggest distractions, as we all know, is cell phone use.
That's why the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) this week recommended that states completely ban cell phones -- including hands-free devices -- while driving.
“This is becoming the new DUI,” said NTSB member Robert Sumwalt. “It’s becoming an epidemic.”
The NTSB doesn't have any regulatory authority, but its recommendations carry a lot of weight with state lawmakers. If U.S. motorists can't show a little more common sense -- and quit tolerating those who lack it -- a lot of them may face much, much stricter rules governing when they can talk or text.
Facebook Rolls Out New Design. If it seems like we've been talking about Facebooks' new Timelines user-interface design, . But this week, Facebook finally rolled out Timelines for all of its users.
Timelines is designed to function as a sort of digital scrapbook, organizing all of a user's posts, photos, links, and other content using an easy-to-access chronological approach. I'm not much of a Facebook user, but I switched over a while back, and I have to admit -- it looks good.
But I also went through my existing Facebook content with a fine-toothed comb, removing content that I didn't want to keep. That'll be a lot harder for prolific, daily Facebook users, but I suggest you do it anyway.
For now, you can activiate the Timeline design on your account by going here. Eventually, everybody will be switched over, whether they like it or not.
Internet Explorer Adopts Auto-Updates. If you're a Google Chrome user, you know that your browser automatically updates whenever Google rolls out a new version. Now, Microsoft has decided to take the same approach to updating Internet Explorer.
Starting soon, anyone who uses automatic updates for Windows will also get auto-updates for Internet Explorer. Microsoft says it will roll out the feature over the next two months, beginning in January.
Microsoft Launches SkyDrive for iOS. In other Microsoft news, the company released a version of its SkyDrive cloud-storage service this week for iPhone and iPad users.
As this PCWorld.com article points out, there's a lot of competition in the cloud storage market these days. Dropbox, Box.net, and Apple's own iCloud service are already popular among iOS users. But Microsoft does offer one compelling perk: 25GB of free online storage for documents and media files.
On the other hand, SkyDrive doesn't appear to have the same flexibility as a service like Dropbox, so the best solution might be the obvious one: Sign up for multiple services, and use each based on its indivdual strengths.
