Now while I tend not affiliate myself with a specific brand, except when it comes to Audi, Apple, Nokia, Google, Firefox, … , okay okay, so maybe I do tend to be a bit brand affiliated, but I promise, it’s only when I believe that the brand deserves mention do I do so!

I’ve been asked a few times by a very diverse collection of people: young, old, entrepreneurs, employees, savers and spenders which bank do I recommend.

My answer has always been roughly the same, “It depends on what you need!”. You see, banks sell a large variety of products, each with its own value proposition. They have bundles, stand-alone services, value added services, etc, etc. The trick is to find the product set that fits your requirement, so check them all out and do all the comparisons yourself.

Personally, I have been with ABSA since the beginning of time. In fact, I just realised that I’ve been with ABSA since before they were even ABSA! I was a United Bank client way back in the day and when ABSA was formed, I just got switched over! Now while I haven’t had awesome service, I can’t seem to think of a single incident when I thought that I was ever getting bad service from them. They have been pretty stable with satisfactory service, which admittedly, should be good enough for anyone!

ABSA’s slogan is “Today, tomorrow, together.” The key word in their slogan, to me, is the bit about tomorrow. Somehow they manage to keep ahead of the rest with technology and have been pretty darn good at making technological products easy for the man in the street. I’m a great big fan of Internet banking, purely because of the convenience. The fact that banks close at 3pm on weekdays and 11am on weekends is just plain annoying and then somehow I always managed to end up in a queue behind old people, stupid people, loud people or just plain annoying people whenever I find the rare need to actually go into the bank!

ABSA has recently hit a milestone that is a pretty big achievement. They have acquired 1 million cellphone banking customers. With an average sign-up rate of 5000 per month, it puts the product at the forefront amongst the other banks in SA. Considering that we live in a mobile saturated market its not surprising at the okes at ABSA are confident that its mobile banking offering will become the biggest touch point between the business and it’s clients. So much so, that Christo Vrey, Managing Executive of ABSA Digital Channels has come out saying that it’s cellphone banking service will overtake that of its Internet banking service!

With 1.7million logins per month, I’m damn sure that the service is brilliant and safe. After all, 1 million users can vouch for it!

Check out more product info here!

Being the big Firefox fan that I am, I am always searching for great plugins to further enhance my browsing experience and I’ve blogged about a few great plugins before.

I’ve come across this very cool plugin that adds a few extra icons to the URL bar of the browser. At first glance, it did seem mildly intimidating, but after using it for a few hours now, I think that its absolutely great!

I’ve found that the guys at LifeHacker also recommend it and I’ve included their review of the plugin below:

Firefox only (Windows/Mac/Linux): Firefox extension UrlbarExt adds 7 new buttons to the Awesome bar with a wide range of genuinely useful functionality to power up your browsing experience.

We’ve mentioned this extension before, but it has since updated with more functionality and upgraded from experimental to officially approved by the Mozilla Add-ons site (no longer requiring a login to install). The functionality of the default buttons include, from left to right:

1. Copy the current site URL or custom formatted URL.
2. Shorten the URL using your favorite service or right-click for more options.
3. Search the current site using Google for the selected keyword. Right-click opens a dialog for adding keywords.
4. Go up one level, or directly to the root of the current site with a double-click. Right-click gives you a list of levels to choose from.
5. Tag and bookmark the current page from a menu of tags.
6. Navigate through sequential URLs. (if the URL ends in a number, it will take you to the next numbered URL)
7. Surf anonymously using online phproxy servers. Right-click lets you view the Google Cache along with other options.

Once installed, the settings panel lets you fully customize which icons are displayed by default or hidden behind the “Grippy”, along with a ton of other options.

Clicking on the Shorten URL button will use your default service, but right-clicking gives you extra options to email or twitter the last shortened URL, or even switch to a different URL shortening service.

And a few other great features! I’d honestly suggest that you install it and give it a shot. Mozilla Firefox’s success is purely a result of its extensibility and the features in this plugin is certainly one that we all use daily!

Download URLBarExt from Firefox’s addon centre here!

I’ve always been criticised about my Google world domination comments, but I will continue to support the notion that if ever a company takes over the world, Google should be it! I simply couldn’t help but smile when Google actively got involved in Obama’s campaign, when Google launched a blog dedicated to Public Policy and when Eric Schmidt spoke about his Energy Security Strategy!

A few months ago, the Big-G, surprised us all by launching a web browser that that they have built without a whisper of it ever happening. Taking us all by surprise, Chrome was launched and distribution was super successful. Its worth is still up for debate: I’m leaning towards Firefox on this one!

Google Desktop was also another reason to get all ansy about the search giant moving towards a full blown OS, but the biggest indication of such trends came when Google launched their mobile OS, Android. Rumours have consistently surfaced about an OS from Google, but no credible evidence has emerged.

However, the guys at Net Applications, a market research company, has discovered that about a third of all Google staff are using a deliberately masked indentification string. It seems that the OS version used by Googles staff is currently being labelled as “Withheld”. Is this the biggest sign yet that Googles world domination will kick off by taking on the PC OS market next?

What about the launch of a cloud computing powered OS designed to further drive the semantic web into a whole new domain? Your guess is as good as mine here, but you can betcha your bottom dollar that I’m excited!

We all love free stuff. Free software is definitely something that we love. Even if it means using pirated software, we will always find a way to get out of paying for software. Luckily, today we are afforded the freedom to choose products that are of the highest quality, really great to use and best of all, are free to download and use as we please.

Since the dawn of open source, innovation has mushroomed to what it is today. Offering free solutions with endless adaptability, extensibility and best of all, stability!

My love for Firefox, GMail, Digsby and the like have all been expressed before and I will continue to preach the wonder known to man as Open Source!

Below, find a list of some of the worlds coolest and best FREE Software. I use some of them myself (not all) and can vouch for about 60% of the list.

1. Firefox (Coolest Web Browser!) (see also: My articles on Firefox!)
2. VLC Media Player (Media Player that simply plays everything!)
3. Ubuntu (OS)
4. Open Office (Office productivity software. Think: MS Office!)(see also: Download OpenOffice 3.0!)
5. Pidgin (IM Aggregator!)
6. Launchy (Desktop Application Launcher)
7. Digsby (I HIGHLY recommend this brilliant IM and social platform aggregator!) (see also: The Next Big Thing!)
8. Gmail (HIGHLY recommended!) (see also: My GMail posts!)
9. Adium (IM Aggregator with cool utilities!)
10. CCleaner (Cookie Cleaner)
11. Picasa (Photo Management software) (see also: Island-Chic’s post!)
12. AutoHotKey
13. Google (Nuff said!)
14. Quicksilver
15. GIMP (Free Image editor. Think Free Photoshop!)
16. Foobar 2000
17. Thunderbird (Desktop Mail client by the guys that brought us Firefox!)
18. 7-Zip (Compression application. Think: Free WinZip!)
19. DropBox
20. uTorrent (Torrent download manager)
21. Winamp (Sweetest out of the box modular media player!)
22. Google Apps (Like the name says, Apps by Google )
23. AVG Antivirus (Light, stable and good antivirus)
24. Evernote
25. IrfanView
26. Opera
27. Chrome (Google’s answer to the ultimate browser!)(see also: My Google Chrome Posts!)
28. Google Calendar (Hosted Calendaring) (see also: My Cool Google Calendar CSS Skin!)
29. HandBrake (Media Converter)
30. Skype (Nuff Said!) (see also: Our complete Skype coverage)
31. Linux (OS)
32. Paint.NET
33. Ad-Aware (Spyware remover! I highly recommend this!)
34. Avast Antivirus (Lightweight Antivirus! I recommend AVG instead though!)
35. Google Docs (Hosted Office Applications)
36. LogMeIn
37. Transmission (Torrent manager! I recommend uTorrent though!)
38. TrueCrypt (Data Encryption)
39. Amarok
40. FileZilla (FTP client by the Mozilla guys!)
41. Notepad++ (Think: Notepad on steriods!)
42. PortableApps.com
43. Rocket Dock
44. Spybot Search & Destroy (Anti Spyware!)
45. UltraVNC
46. VirtualBox

If you want to recommend any other free applications, drop a line in the comments and I’ll add it to the list!

My love for Mozilla extends past the fact that its free to use. The greatest asset that Mozilla packs into Firefox, Thunderbird and it’s other products is it’s relentless extensibility. I’ve posted previously about a few add-ons that are really cool, but Island-Chic has very recently put together a newer list of really cool Firefox addons and I’m still finding new cool stuff

With that in mind, the guys at the Mozilla camp can certainly whip out the confetti, champagne and cold fatty chicken platters today! They have served up 1 Billion addons for the products. Thats an astonishing number and further highlights the growing popularity of the open source gods!

Well Done Mozilla! I’ve been a fan for a while and will continue to patronize IE users as much as possible until you take your current 20% market share and slip it into the dominance region of about 40%!

Now it seems that everyone has AdSense on individual “tweets.” At least that’s what I’m seeing on individual tweets using FireFox and IE7 in Microsoft Vista and in XP. I don’t have a Mac of Linux machine to check if it’s the same on that!

I’m Sorry… but when I saw this, I laughed till my eyes started tearing! This is BRILLIANT!

Twitter Gets Adsense!

Click on the image if you can’t read the text…trust me… its worth it!

Show your love for Mozilla Firefox with one of these really cool high-res wallpapers! Don’t forget to check out Firefox 3 and the really cool plugin selection that I suggest!

A regular to my blog will know by now that I’m a HUGE Google fan. I’ve said it before and I will stand by my statements, that if any company takes over the world, it should be Google!

They have recently been VERY aggressive in shaping the way we use the internet and have even been trying to OWN the internet, by buying up ISP’s, laying down cables and even looking at launching satellites to facilitate cheaper internet access.Google Gears was a major step towards cloud computing and Google has strategically launched an array of other products to enable a semantic web environment. Their latest product has been over blogged about recently and has definitely shaken up the browser market, Google Chrome.

Google has the habit of building really great applications and offer them free to the public. They are usually at the forefront of usability, speed and reliability, but is Google Chrome actually better than Firefox? I still find myself using Firefox as my default browser as my love for Firefox’s extensibility is yet to be challenged by a similar offering. Especially with plugins like the Cool Gmail Skin, Firebug and a host of other really great plugins available!

LifeHacker has recently done some pretty good testing on Google Chrome, Firefox 3.0 and Internet Explorer 8.0b. The test results are VERY interesting:

The Tests

As with my previous browser tests, I installed completely fresh copies of the three browsers on my Windows Vista laptop, with all settings left to defaults. With the second beta of Internet Explorer 8, I reset the browser to factory settings and chose whatever Microsoft suggested during the click-through setup.

My test system has the same specs as before: A 2 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor, 2GB of memory, and running Windows Vista Home Premium. For the time-based tests, I again used Rob Keir’s ultra-lightweight timer app, simultaneously tapping the “\” key with “Enter” to launch a browser shortcut or folder full of bookmarks. I performed each test on each browser three times and averaged out the results, while eliminating obvious oddities. (With Vista’s often empirical hard drive usage, there were definitely artificially long start-ups).

It’s the same system I used to test Internet Explorer 7, Firefox 3 RC3, Safari for Windows, and Opera 9.5, so you can make fair comparisons between all the browsers. It’s not scientific in the strict sense, but it’s meant to measure browser performance as real humans experience it—load, click, and wait.

Test 1: Startup Time—Winner: Chrome!

Drawing inspiration again from Mark Wilton-Jones trend-setting tests, I timed each browser loading up “cold” load (straight off a system restart) and “warm” (having run twice already). I used a locally-saved copy of Google’s minimalist home page to negate net connection variations, and, to compensate for Vista’s start-up fickleness, timed each browser exactly two minutes after boot-up. Here are the first results:

Note the small scale of the time on the X-axis: Even though Chrome was (quite surprisingly) slower at startup than Firefox or even IE 8, it’s less than a second of difference between them all. That’s a bit more than an error from my twitchy fingers, but probably not enough to rate any one browser on. Let’s check out the warm boots:

As you can see, Chrome’s noticeably fast on reload, although all the results are so close it’s hard to confidently crown a winner. Just like last time, IE 8 slightly edges out Firefox on warm boots, but lags just a bit behind when starting up.

You don’t start your browser to look at clean, white, locally-saved pages, do you? No, you speed around your must-visit sites, and often keep a bushel of them open at once. For the next test, I led each browser page-by-page through the assortment of web sites pictured at right—some heavy with interactive elements, some just text and pictures—before jumping back to a blank page (entering about:blank does this in any browser) and loading all the links at once. Each browser keeps a spinning icon on tabs as they load, so I measured from first click to the last tab settling in.

IE 8 and Chrome clock in too close to call, but Firefox fell behind. Based on the minuscule difference in cold-boot time and the two warm tests, I’d call Chrome the fastest, but definitely hand IE 8 a Most Improved Player trophy at the awards banquet.

Test 2: JavaScript & CSS—Tie: Firefox & Chrome!

JavaScript continues to grow in importance as a browser benchmark, because it’s the backbone of no-reload interfaces like Gmail, Facebook, and lots of other webapps. Once again I used Sean Patrick Kane’s revised JavaScript speed tests and averaged out three results to measure the browsers:

Firefox bests Chrome in this test by a handy lead, while IE 8 takes nearly twice as long (in milliseconds, of course) to perform all the actions Sean runs it through. It’s anybody’s guess who’s got the most objective test—CNET’s testers show Chrome wr
ecking all comers, while Mozilla’s own tests declare their orange scrapper the winner in tight races. I can only take away that IE 8 is definitely an improvement from IE 7’s fall-behind pace, while Chrome and Firefox are pretty evenly matched…

…until I ran the CSS tests, that is. CSS determines the layout and appearance of a page, and nontropp’s downloadable form makes a browser work like a page designer on an all-guarana-and-coffee diet.

In the CSS test, as you can see, Chrome takes a commanding lead, Firefox doesn’t lag too far behind, and IE 8 actually stalled and froze on just about one of every two loads I ran. When it came out of memory freeze, it did report consistent times, though—consistently behind. One could hand the Dynamic Web Performance title to Firefox for the probably weightier JavaScript test, but Chrome also shows a notable grace in running down the type frequently found on blogs. Let’s call this a tie.

Test 3: Memory Use—Winner: Firefox!

How far the great-great-nephew of Netscape has come in its respect for your system’s resources. Measured by Vista’s Task Manager from cold boots and then with eight tabs loaded, Firefox shows some serious savvy with megabytes:

Do note, however, that Chrome handles tabs differently than others—each tab loads as its own process, so that if it crashes or stalls, the rest of your reading doesn’t go down with it. So if you’ve got solid-state chips to spare, it’s not that much more of a hit to run Chrome in a busy session.

As with our last test, we’ll note that browsing is much more than speed and bit usage—many of us can’t imagine web life without our favorite extensions, or Windows integration, or, soon enough, Chrome’s unique features.

What’s been your experience with the newest competitors in the web field? Got your own criteria to compare? Share it all in the comments.

Kevin Purdy, associate editor at Lifehacker, wrote this feature in all three beta browsers. His weekly feature, Open Sourcery, normally appears Fridays on Lifehacker. Subscribe to the Open Sourcery feed to get new installments in your newsreader.