Using email to communicate with a group of people means you should think through the difference of reply and reply all, along with using the BCC (blind carbon copy) address field. Most people know of putting additional addresses in the TO field so that replies can come back to all. The key for this to work is that you, the recipient, have to click on reply all, not just reply, or your reply only goes to the sender. Suddenly, the rest of the group is missing out on your wisdom. I always click reply all and then review the addresses if there are more than one, just a new habit so that I don’t drop others out of a conversation.
Although there is a bit of a learning curve, the new GIMP 3.0, a great replacement for Photoshop, has been released. If you are still frustrated by Adobe’s rental pricing, try GIMP <https://www.gimp.org/>, and check out their tutorials at <https://www.gimp.org/tutorials/>. If you have a Buncombe County library card, there are older GIMP tutorials through Linkedin Learning (and if you don’t you are missing out on a great resource.)
By the time you read this, Amazon will get recordings of all commands spoke to Alexa in Echo speakers and other smart devices. Simple commands used to be handled locally on the device, this change is part of Amazon’s push into AI. They are claiming encrypted traffic to their cloud and that recordings will be deleted as soon as they are processed. Still, be careful what you say around your Alexa.
If you still use Skype it is going away this May. Microsoft is replacing it with Teams which many have learned to “like.” You can still use your existing Skype login with Teams, which will bring over your existing contacts and chats. If you still have paid up credit with Skype you will be able to use it, but not renew it.
Removing your personal info from Google searches is possible with their Results about you tool. Once you put in some basic personal information, name, address, phone, email, etc., Google will check their searches and let you know what they find. Once they find some search result with your information, use their infamous triple dot by each entry to find more about what you can do. They can’t actually take the information off the linked sites, but they can break those searches for your personal information. <https://myactivity.google.com/results-about-you>
Online file converts seem so useful but there are some that can infect your computer, even as they deliver on the file conversion. It is much safer to see if the program you used to make a file has a way to “export” or “save as” your file into a different format. Additionally, something like LibreOffice (libreoffice.org) can open many of the Microsoft file formats and then save them to something different.
If you have ever needed a minimalist street map, no names or anything, look at MapCanvas at https://mapcanvas.store/. There you can finally get a map that you can mark up for specific uses.