Friday tips for iPhone users – Don’t be afraid of contact lists

If you don’t feel comfortable having your entire list of friends and family in a database that can be shared via email, calendars, Facebook, etc., I can relate. (I have been known to avoid online banking.) If you just got an iPhone, but still keep a written list of phone numbers and have to hand-type them to make a call or if you do the same with email (hand-typing them all in each time), then this is aimed at you. Picture your happy place, relax, and read on.

Contact lists are sacred and, yes, you should be cautious. Read up on best practices and security tips. But, when you feel ready, it really will be okay to take the leap. And, leap big—add the email and phone number and street addresses.

Here are the benefits:

• Saves time—when you want to tell 30 people that you just passed the big exam, you can just select their names and the email addresses will come up.

• Saves returned mail—how many times have you hand-keyed an address and gotten a letter wrong?

• Helps with memory-loss—how many times have you gone to dial a number you think you know by heart and you go blank? In fact, how many phone numbers do you know by heart anymore? My parents’ and siblings’ numbers have changed so often in the last 10 years that I don’t know most of them by heart (sad but true).

• If you fill it in one time, you never have to fill it in again. You can back it up so that if your phone falls into the Severn River, you still have your phone numbers.

• When you want to send a package and you are at the post office at 10 minutes to closing but forgot the address, you have it right there. You know you forget to bring the little black address book, but you probably won’t forget your phone, right? (well, I am hoping….)

• Lyle won’t think you are crazy (me: Hon, what are your top 3 reasons to use a contact list? Lyle: Huh? Why wouldn’t you use one? Are you serious? Don’t blog about this, please.)

If you need help figuring out how to use the contact list, there are plenty of "how-to" links, such as this one at eHow: http://www.ehow.com/how_2075772_add-contacts-iphone.html

There are still a few questions yet to be answered over the next few weeks. Stay tuned to read about GPS, YouTube, and WiFi, coming soon.

And, don’t forget to get SoDunked! and tell two friends. Thanks!