Western Union's smartphone app creates more problems than it solves

By Gadjo Cardenas Sevilla

Western Union has millions of users globally and, until now, the main way to send money or make payments was to go to their physicial outlets and fill out paper forms to enable the transactions. During recent visits to send or receive money using Western Union, the service personnel kept urging me to try the app. "It is faster," they said and "you'll save money using the app."

So I installed the WU Mobile app, excited to be able to send and receive money on my terms, without having to line up in a Western Union Agent location.

Setting up the app on my Samsung smartphone was straightforward and quick. I entered basic information, attached a Credit Card to make payments and put a list of payees. I liked the interface and also being able to see the currency conversion on the fly by country plus knowing exactly what I had to pay. My experience went downhill from there.

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Review: Dyson Pure Cool HEPA Air Purifier and Fan

By Gadjo Cardenas Sevilla

With the current heat wave hitting Ontario and parts of Quebec, we find ourselves in a position where even our air condition units can't really cool as well as they used to.

One solution worth considering during heat waves are electric fans which can do more than move hot air around. In my case, my apartment's central AC can't cool the whole unit properly, so we've used various fans to mitigate the unbearable heat.

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Apple's iOS App Store marks 10th anniversary

Apple's App store celebrates a milestone on July 10 as it turns 10. It's hard to believe that the original iPhone didn't have an app store and shipped with basically web-apps that required a constant Internet connection.App Store launched with 500 apps and ten years later there are an estimated 2,000,000 apps available for iPhones and iPads,

The end result is that there are now 20 million registered developers on iOS, and collectively they have made about $100 billion in revenues, with the App Store bringing in some 500 million visitors per week.

CALM meditation app helps FIFA World Cup soccer fans de-stress during game time

The world's most popular meditation app has launched a series of quick guided calming moments designed for FIFA World Cup fans. CALM.com 's "World Cup Collection" was created to help fans who stress over the ups and downs of their favourite teams while in play. 

Three separate meditations of different lengths are offered:

A short, three-minute breathing mediation called a "Penalty Shoot-Out Breather" offers fans a break in between anxious moments at the end of extra-time and the start of the penalty shoot-out, that typically lasts four minutes. 

A longer 10 minute meditation is available for fans to use to help calm their nerves during either most or all of the penalty shoot-out itself. 

A broader meditation in the format of Calm's normal "Daily Calm", which focuses on the same theme but makes it relevant to other Calm users facing moments of acute anxiety. 

Find them at calm.com