Archive for April 4th, 2008

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TwitterLocal is a great tool for finding other Twitter users and tweets in your area.

You can use TwitterLocal one of two ways: by using the simple web form on their website, or by downloading the Adobe AIR application, which also enables you to send tweets and follow your friend’s replies (functionality similar to Twhirl).

The web form is simple enough: enter in your location (using a postal code and/or city and state), select the radius you want to search (from 1 mile to 50 miles), and hit the Go button. Tweets in the selected area are supplied in both an RSS and XML feed.

All in all, this is a handy tool for finding tweets and Twitterers in your area. Who knows, maybe you’ll one day meet a local Twitterer at the grocery store or Jiffy Lube. Though that might be hard, because:

  1. People who use Twitter don’t often go out into the sunlight. It hurts us.
  2. Though billed as a social tool, Twitter is actually for people who fear social interaction. Thus, even if one Twitterer recognized a fellow Twitterer in a store or other public location, they’d probably scurry away before a confrontation could ensue.
  3. Our Twitter alter-egos are often so different from our real selves that others would have a hard time recognizing us. We might be Superman in the Twitter universe, but outside we’re merely mild-mannered reporters.

The desktop version of TwitterLocal requires Adobe Air.

[via Paisano]

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If you ever saw the show Repo Man: Stealing for a Living, you know that taking back a automobile from a deadbeat buyer can be a challenging — and expensive — ordeal.

Now finance companies who work with subprime car buyers are fighting back. The Sekurus Company offers lenders a “payment protection system.” If you’re behind on your payment, a small device installed in the car beeps. Make the payment and you enter a pin # and it stops beeping. If you don’t pay, Sekurus’ device will turn off the car’s engine!This is a great idea. First, I don’t think anyone at WalletPop would advise anyone with poor credit to take out a automobile loan that’s for more than enough to buy a total clunker — in which case they might not bother with the high-priced device.

But this product may help cut down on repo costs — the GPS system makes it easy for them to find you after they turn off your engine — which might, in turn, cut down on the interest rates lenders have to charge on vehicle loans.

But still: don’t take out a high-interest loan to buy a depreciating asset. Please, please, please.

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