Yesterday, I turned 26. It was by far the best birthday I've had in at least five years, and it wasn't just because my friend Bonnie made me homemade birthday cookies (see below) or the fact that 30 of my closest friends helped me celebrate into the wee hours of the morning at the classiest joint in all of Los Angeles - The Belmont.

Rather than receiving gifts from my family and friends this year, I asked all my friends and family to donate to charity: water and help me raise enough money to build a freshwater well for a village in Ethiopia.

Did you know that over 1 billion people in the world go without clean, safe drinking water? That to me is just absurd, and considering the wastefulness we contribute to here, I couldn't find one reason not to do this.

So why was this the best birthday? Well, I was successful! After I raised over $400 through the help of family and friends, CEO and Founder of Mashable.com, Pete Cashmore reached out to me. Not only does Pete share my birthday, but he was also working towards his own goal of raising money for charity: water. Pete and I are both on Twitter. Thanks to his supremely impressive following, he was able to raise over $3,500 in one day. That, in addition to my small but helpful contribution of $400, and with the help of another Sept 18-birthday-Tweeter, Paul Young, we collectively raised enough money to build a freshwater well in Ethiopia. This will provide over 200 people with clean, safe drinking water.

Pete was kind enough to write a piece about our efforts on Mashable today - and you should all check it out...

The Well That Twitter Built

On September 18th 2008, Mashable’s Twitter followers donated $3536 to Charity:Water, an initiative to build wells in Ethiopia. On the same day, our Twitter friend Paul Young raised a further $637 through his Twitter and Facebook accounts. And Twitter user Sarah Townsend hauled in $400 - that’s more than $4500, almost exclusively from Twitter, in a single day. With $4000 buying an entire well to supply water to 200 people for 20 years, we can truly call this the “well that Twitter built”.

To fully understand how much this means, take a few minutes to watch this video!

THANK YOU to all who contributed, to Pete, Mashable, Twitter, and charity: water for making this all possible. BEST birthday gift ever.

Yours Truly,
Sarah Townsend aka TechDarling

P.S. If you want to contribute, visit this link:

100% of the proceeds fund water projects in Ethiopia.

theoneinpink invites you to SocialVibe.com    

I might be missing the festivities tonight (TechSet party would have been fun, boo hoo), but I won't miss a second of the action this weekend in Las Vegas. I'm off to BlogWorld Expo this weekend, for the first time ever. I'll be representing SocialVibe, along with TechDarling, and I'm looking forward to meeting all you fabulous bloggers out there!

Can't wait to see what this weekend brings, and what I bring back from this weekend! Believe it or not it'll be my first time in Vegas. I'm finally cracking! I'm staying at the Venetian, though, so at least I'll be comfortable.

Seeing as I'm still recovering from birthday overload, I haven't even started packing. I guess I should get on that!

Are you gonna be at BlogWorld? DM me on Twitter and lets meet up!

Years and years of our childhood were spent guiding Mario through kingdom after kingdom, dodging turtle shells, poisonous mushrooms, and of course - Bowser.

But what happens AFTER Mario finally reaches his princess and saves her? Do they live happily ever after? I mean, he IS a short, chubby plumber, after all. And she IS a princess. Highly unlikely.

Let's take a look at what Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane thinks happened.

From one princess to another, I don't blame Peach. Thanks but no thanks, Mario!

But seriously - "You got captured by something that goes on a salad!" - hahaha.

You know as well as I do that no one loves writing about girly tech products more than me. But after tonight, I'm thinking of making a switch to blogging about fancy hotels, simply because of the opportunities I'd get to come stay in pretty rooms like the one I have at the Venetian right now. I must be learning disabled, though, because it took me at least 30 minutes to figure out how to use the remote controlled curtains. So much for being the Tech Darling.

Your favorite blogger, TechDarling!

BlogWorld 2008 is off and running, and it's been absolutely insane. In a good way! Sat in on some really great panel discussions about Search Engine Optimization, Social Media Marketing & New Media, as well as Blogging & PR. Some amaaazing panelists. Hung out with some current friends from maxgladwell.com and sodahead.com, and made some new friends at ideablob.com, blogcatalog.com, mashable.com, memelabs.com, and apture.com.

Now I'm off to the Zappos.com party at Planet Hollywood.

For photos of the Expo, check Flickr for the tag "bwe08."

Technology trend forecaster Aul Saffo was quoted in a recent New York Times article claiming that text messaging actually makes people dumber. Really?

"The act of texting automatically removes 10 I.Q. points. The truth of the matter is there are hobbies that are incompatible. You don't want to do mushroom-hunting and bird-watching at the same time, and it is the same with texting and other activities. We have all seen people walk into parking meters or walk into traffic and seem startled by oncoming cars."

I'd be curious to know how exactly Saffo arrived at the number 10, but I'd be lying if I said the statement was entirely false. I can't count the number of times that I have nearly run straight into someone - or started heading off in the wrong direction - simply because my head was buried in my Blackberry or iPhone (lets just be thankful California now requires hands-free devices while driving!) So if we are so completely absorbed with what is going on in our handheld devices, can we really be aware of what is going on around us? And are we dumber because of it?

Perhaps not, and we are just excellent multi-taskers.

I'm not so sure we are, and the recent train collision in Los Angeles helps prove it. With the overwhelming surge of mediums by which we can connect with our peers on - are we spending just as much time maintaining these networks as we do actually connecting with one another and discussing what we came to talk about in the first place?

I successfully spent two full days in Las Vegas without really seeing much of it at all. You might be wondering how that is even possible, considering the amount of time spent going back and forth from Convention Center, to casinos, to clubs, to the airport with all the BlogWorld Expo attendees. Plenty of time to take in the sights, right? Wrong. Once again - my face was buried in my iPhone, reading tweets, checking e-mail, responding to text messages, finding out where everyone was. And I know I wasn't the only one. There was so much #bwe08 traffic on Twitter, even those that were unable to make it to conference could still participate in the action.

So yes, it's blatantly obvious that we have developed an addiction to mobile computing. With the wide variety of choices available to us - from smartphones to PDAs to teeny tiny laptops - in addition to the never ending flood of slick new applications and programs, it's virtually impossible to avoid giving into the trend. And considering the impact services like Twitter are having on business development, it could be a mistake not to get involved!

So where do we draw the line? How much networking is too much? And is it really making us dumber?

Attention 18 and 19 year olds: You no longer have an excuse not to vote. As if it weren't as easy as logging onto voteforchange.com, Microsoft has now enabled you to register to vote without even leaving the comfort of your gaming console.

That's right, you can now register to vote on your Xbox!

In collaboration with rockthevote.com, Microsoft is giving Xbox 360® owners the ability to register to vote, participate in presidential polls, and voice their opinions to the presidential candidates.

"The Xbox LIVE community is active, vocal, and passionate," said Marc Whitten, general manager of Xbox LIVE. "We're thrilled to partner with Rock the Vote to make it easier than ever for youth voters—and our members—to register and be heard."

So take a break from playing Rock Band or Half Life 2 and register to vote, dammit. I don't even care who you vote for (as long as it's not Sarah Palin :) ) - just take the time to educate yourself!

The future of our country is at stake!!!!

By now we are all well aware of Google and T-Mobile's answer to the iPhone, the Android G1. If you are a Google lover, or anti-Apple, this is the phone for you.

My opinion? Of course I'm mostly concerned with looks. I like the white-ness of it, but I kind of hate the keypad. It looks like one of those cheap remote controls that comes with your portable DVD player! Or, the crappy remote that is inside the arm rest on the airplane.

So here is the low down on its guts: The G1 has GPS, WiFi, a touchscreen, an accelerometer (how fast does it fall when you throw it up in the air.. dorks), a camera, Gmail, Google Maps, a Webkit-based browser (just like Safari on the iPhone), and an App market, similar to the iPhone App Store. It is $20 cheaper than the iPhone, at $180 for existing customers, and comes with two data plans: $25 a month (with unlimited Web access and limited text messaging) and $35 a month (with unlimited everything).

You'll have to wait until Oct 22 to actually get the thing, but exisiting T-Mobile customers can pre-order online.

Here is what Google has to say about it:

TechCrunch leaked a sneak peek at a few of the applications available for the Android... this is the good stuff. Here are a few of my favorites:

BreadCrumbz— Create a route on a map using pictures of landmarks to enhance the directions.

Cocktail—Tell it what ingredients you have at hand, and it gives you a list of the cocktails you can make. Love it!

EcoRio— Helps you reduce your carbon footprint. I'm curious!

Krystle II— A touchy, feely Tomigochi. This app turns your phone into a pet that you need to take care of and stroke, using the touch screen, of course. Gross. (Agreed, TC.)

Photostream—A Flickr photo browser. Great idea.

Pocket Seismograph— Exactly what it sounds like - REALLY would have come in handy during the recent earthquake/twitterquake!

Quicklist— A to-do list. I pretty much can't get anything done without making a list first, so this would be a must for me.

Ringroid—Create a ringtone from any song in your music library. So no more PhoneZoo!

ShopSavvy— Uses the camera as a bar-code scanner to let you compare prices while shopping in a store. HELLO? This is brilliant. (Not that I generally look at the price too much, which might explain the state of my finances.)

Text-to-Speech Library— Turns text into speech through the phone’s speaker. I could imagine saying dirty phrases into this frequently with my equally immature co-workers.

Translate— Uses Google Translate to turn foreign words into your own language. Basic function but helpful nonetheless!

I'd really have to play with it to judge, but overall, I like. I am sticking with the iPhone, though. Transitioning from Blackberry to iPhone was hard enough!

Who isn't on Twitter these days? My good friend Peter was just whining to me that even his Mom is on Twitter, much to his disappointment. You're nobody if you're not on Twitter, at least according to this guy!

And as a proud internet and gadget geek of many, many years, I completely agree. :)

Now we have the new commercial for the T-Mobile/Google G1-

My favorite part is probably the use of the word "Funnerer." Cute. And only a little bit obnoxious.

I'm a huge fan of the Sugar Network - GeekSugar, PopSugar, FabSugar, even PetSugar it's all sweet to me.

The latest addition to the Sugar family is OnSugar, a new online publishing platform that allows you to create your own bloggeries featuring text, photo galleries and fun add-ons like polls, quizzes, audio and video. It's free, it's cute, and you also have access to hundreds of thousands of Getty Images ... you know, for all those wanna-be celebrity bloggers. It's like Blogging 101. The Easy Bake Oven of blogging, if you will.

Already have a blog and want to move to onSugar? No problem, they make it easy to import your content from Blogger, Wordpress or Typepad.

via PopSugar

I can remember when 8mpx was impressive. Now we're seeing teasers for digital cameras with 50 megapixels??? I'd love to see where this is going.

What it is: HASSELBLAD's H3DII-50

What it looks like:

Here are the deets:
The 50 Mpixel 36×48mm sensor, which measures, twice the physical size of the largest 35mm DSLR sensors, the H3DII-50 camera system has been specially designed to meet the most exacting demands of high-end commercial photographers who require the ultimate in both image quality and performance.

Who wants to take a guess at the cost of this bad boy?

ANSWER: $28,000 (Thanks Nicholas)

via Hasselblad USA

I'm a big fan of any silly, seemingly useless tech products, and ThinkGeek is known for making some of the best, so I automatically adore them (it doesn't hurt that they are based out of Fairfax, VA - my birthplace). One of their latest products - the electronic drum kit t-shirt - is hilarious, and brilliant.

Finally! A way for me to practice my drumming skills without having to drag my bulky drum kit around. Totally kidding by the way, I don't play any instruments, I'm devoid of any musical talent. But I might inconspicuously send this to my neighbor, who insists on practicing drums in his garage which just so happens to be right next to my apartment. Quite the treat at 11:30pm when you're trying to sleep.

via geekologie