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Its spring, and nature is pulling me away from my computer as I write this. The sun is shining, the world is warming up, and the birds are chirping away. And that got me thinking: What if a smartphone app could translate all those chirps for us? No, Im not talking about an app that will translate bird sounds to human speech (although that would be neat). Rather, the app we’re about to go over tells you what specific species is making any bird sound around youkind of like Shazam, only for nature. All you have to do is hold up your phone and press one button. Its an app Ive personally used a bunch over the years and happily rediscovered this year. Its especially nice when travelingor if youve moved and youre not sure which birds are in your area. One way or another, if you’re hearing chirping and you aren’t sure what animal is responsible, youre in for a treat. Unearth all sorts of little-known tech treasures with my free Cool Tools newsletter from The Intelligence. A spiffy new discovery in your inbox every Wednesday! Animal intelligenceShazam style Ready to fly into uncharted nature territory? The app you need is called Merlin Bird ID, and its created by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology at Cornell University. Its completely free, and it can work both online and off. You dont even need to create an account. To get started, install the free Merlin app for Android from Google Play, or get the iPhone version from the Apple App Store. While the app is free, you will be asked to provide an email address to sign up to the university’s newsletter before you can use it. (You can unsubscribe whenever you like, of courseand it appears you can enter any email address, too, even if it maybe isn’t associated with your primary personal inbox.) After going through a few screens of setup, youll get to the core part of the appa big green microphone button with Sound ID on it. Tap the button, and Merlin will start recording audio from your phones microphone. If there are audible bird sounds in the area, it’ll then attempt to compare those to bird calls in its database and tell you which exact bird is behind them. Merlin is impressively effective at identifying birds based solely on their sounds. It works really well, and itll keep recording and list multiple bird species if more than one creature is making noise around you. You can tap each bird species for more information, too. Merlin can handle multiple birds at once, if you’re in an area with a cacophony of creatures. It really is that simplebut theres more you can do, if you’re so inspired. For example, you can replay your recordings later so you can get to know all the birds you encountered. And, you can download offline birds for various regions so you can even identify birds if youre off in the wilderness and dont have an active data connection. Thats alljust a free app provided by a university that works well and has no ads or other asterisks. It’s earned itself an underground cult following for a reason. Merlin is available as a native app for both Android and iOS. It’s completely freeno catches. And it doesnt sell or share your data. Its created by a science lab at a university. Keep the tech tools coming with my free Cool Tools newsletter! You’ll get an instant introduction to an incredible audio app and a new off-the-beaten-path gem in your inbox every Wednesday.
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E-Commerce
This weekend, you will need to put on your Sunday clothesespecially a fancy hata day early. The 151st Run for the Roses, better known as the 2025 Kentucky Derby, will take off at 6:57 p.m. ET, on Saturday, May 3, at Churchill Downs in Louisville, Kentucky. Twenty three-year-old thoroughbreds have qualified through the “Road to the Kentucky Derby” points system and are ready to leave it all on the track. Heres what you need to know going into the big race day. Drama on and off the track Trainer Bob Baffert is back after serving a three-year suspension beginning in 2021, which was instituted after the 147th Kentucky Derby winner, Medina Spirit, tested positive for betamethasone. This steroid is an acceptable therapeutic treatment for horses but becomes illegal when found in the bloodstream as it can be considered a performance-enhancing drug. Beyond the suspension, Baffert was forced to vacate this victory. Even without Medina Spirit, Baffert has six other Kentucky Derby wins, but so does trainer Ben Jones. Baffert is hoping to best him this year and has even hedged his bets by entering two horses to make up for lost time. He has spent countless hours training Citizen Bull and Rodriguez for these two minutes. Fellow trainer Steve Asmussen also took this strategy with Publisher and Tiztastic, but he has yet to win a Derby, despite an impressive track record. Please tell us the odds Han Solo might not have appreciated when C-3P0 told him the odds in The Empire Strikes Back, but this isnt space travel. Ed DeRosa of Louisville’s Courier Journal picked three possible winning horses for readers to consider. He is betting on Journalism, the 3-to-1 favorite, in part because this horse is on a winning streak and does well under pressure. DeRosa also pointed out Chunk of Golds (30 to 1) noteworthy race in the Louisiana Derby. And dont count out Rodriguezs speed. Jody Demling, publisher of Cardinal Authority, has a different take and is fading Rodriguez (12-1), as CBS Sports reports. He agrees that Journalism is a sure thing and also points out Sandmans (6 to 1) closing speed. Anything can happen on race day during those 10 furloughs. How can I watch or stream the 2025 Kentucky Derby? The 2025 Kentucky Derby will take place at 6:57 p.m ET on Saturday. Viewers with traditional cable can tune into NBC or watch the race on NBC.com with their pay-TV credentials. There are 14 other races on the same day and lots of hats to see, so the pre-show begins at 2:30 p.m. ET. Also on cable, the USA Netwok’s pre-race coverage begins at 12 p.m. ET if you want even more. If you have cut the cable cord, you can watch live on Peacock, NBCUniversals streaming service. The streamer’s own coverage begins at 12 p.m. ET. Other live-TV streaming services also carry NBC. They include: Fubo Sling YouTube TV And don’t forget, NBC is free over the air if you have an antenna. Whatever way you choose to tune it, it is sure to be an exciting race.
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E-Commerce
When Skype debuted in 2003, it was the first time I remember feeling that an individual appand not just the broader internetwas radically disrupting communications. Thanks to its implementation of the voice over internet protocol (VOIP) and its simple interface, the app allowed users worldwide to call virtually any phone number directly from their PC with ease, in addition to calling other Skype users via its peer-to-peer (P2P) network. If you are too young to remember a time before smartphones, FaceTime, and WhatsApp, take it from me that Skypes launch was truly revolutionary. It suddenly became simple to call home if you were traveling internationally. And if you frequently needed to contact overseas companies or individuals for work, Skype significantly reduced the associated costs. Bye-bye, outrageous international phone call charges. But come Monday, May 5, 2025nearly 22 years after it changed communicationsSkype will shut down for good. Since P2P voice calling is now integrated into nearly every popular messenger app, many will not miss it. But for the subset of us who continue to use Skype to call bona fide phone numbers via VOIP, well need to find new solutions. Heres why Skype is shutting down and how you can find suitable VOIP alternatives. The downfall of Skype Over the course of its 22 years, Skype has changed ownership many times. In 2005, just two years after the Luxembourg-headquartered Skype Technologies debuted its revolutionary app, eBay acquired it for $2.5 billion. In 2009, eBay sold its majority ownership in the app to private investors. Finally, in 2011, the service was sold in its entirety to Microsoft for $8.5 billion. At the time, $8.5 billion was the most Microsoft had ever paid for a companyand there was a good reason why it made the splurge. By 2008, Skype had swelled to a base of 400 million registered users, making it one of the most-used apps in the world. Microsoft saw Skype as the future of communication, and when the 2011 acquisition was announced, Skype CEO Tony Bates said that with Microsofts ownership, we will be able to accelerate Skypes goal to reach 1 billion users daily. But over the next several years, as Microsoft integrated Skype into everything from Windows to smartphones to Xbox consoles, the app increasingly became bloated, going through numerous UI refreshes. What was once an easy P2P and VOIP service that allowed you to quickly call other users and nearly any phone number in the world was now cumbersome to use. But Skypes problems werent all self-inflicted. The service was also faced with an explosion of competition. As smartphones proliferated, nearly every major communications app added P2P calling, including giants like Metas WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger, Apples FaceTime, and even more niche messengers like Signal. The mid-2010s also saw the rise of business communications apps like Slack and Microsofts own Teamseach of which allowed workers to communicate with their peers efficiently over text, voice, or video. And then came the pandemic in 2020. The world was under lockdown. This should have been the time for Skype to shine, but instead, Zoom took over, becoming the go-to communications app. It was simple to use, whereas Skype was cumbersome. Skype never recovered from that missed opportunity. With other apps having gobbled up Skype’s user base, and Microsoft’s increasing focus on Teams as its communications platform of choice, its no wonder that earlier this year, the company announced Skype will shut down for good on May 5. Skype VOIP alternatives for calling landline and mobile phone numbers The two main features that helped Skype take the world by storm in the early 2000s were P2P and VOIP calling. P2P let one Skype user call another using their username as the call identifier. VOIP let a Skype user call an actual phone number from the Skype app. Today, P2P calling apps are ubiquitous. The technology is integrated into nearly every smartphone messaging and communications app out there, including FaceTime, WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, and Signal. Heck, even photo-sharing apps like Instagram have P2P calling functionality. But if you want to call an actual phone number from a smartphone app or your computer, your options are much more limitedespecially after Skype shuts down on Monday. Thats because none of the popular apps above support VOIP calling. However, there are still a few good VOIP alternatives out there. Some of the best include: Google Voice: Google Voice gives you a phone number anyone can call to reach you, and from your Google Voice account, you can also make VOIP calls to most phone numbers in the world. However, VOIP calling is limited to users in the United States and Canada. Viber Out: Viber Out is an add-on service from the makers of the free Viber app, a P2P communications app. Viber Out adds VOIP functionality to Viber. This is the solution that most resembles what Skype was like in its prime: a simple, easy-to-use VOIP solution that allows you to purchase a variety of calling plans. Worldwide monthly subscription plans that let you call mobile and landlines start at just $5.99/month at the time of this writing. Zoom Phone: This is an add-on plan to Zoom that allows you to make VOIP calls to cell phones and landlines right from the Zoom app. This makes Zoom Phone similar to both Skype and Viber Out. There are various pricing options depending on whether you plan to make calls to U.S. and Canadian numbers or to phone numbers in other countries. Its worth noting that Microsoft will also continue to offer ways for people to call landline phone numbers via a Microsoft Teams add-on feature called Teams Phone. However, Teams Phone is heavily designed around business use, so its features may be overkill and its cost a bit impractical for individuals simply looking for a quick, easy, and cheap way to make VOIP calls. Microsoft has also confirmed that any Skype users who still have active Skype Credits and subscriptions (which were required to make VOIP calls via Skype) after May 5 can still make VOIP calls by using a new Skype Dial Pad tool, which will remain available on the Skype web portal and withinthe free version of Microsoft Teams, known as Teams Free. However, these solutions are only available as long as your existing Skype credits or subscriptions remain.
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E-Commerce
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