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Things have been busier than ever over the past few weeks, which makes me hugely thankful as someone who is mainly freelancing. And as a result, I’ve been reminding myself of various ways to keep inspired and avoid getting stressed.

Besides reading, videogames, and actually getting outside with my family, there are still some things which work whilst staying in front of a PC screen. Some research may suggest videos or images of cute animals helps lower stress levels, and I’m not averse to the odd lolcat, but I think the best thing I’ve found is a couple of minutes looking at ‘Interesting photos from the last 7 days‘ on Flickr.

It’s incredibly simple – a page of 9 photos which Flickr users found interesting. And the Reload button finds 9 more. And so on until infinity, or the next week presumably roles around.

But beyond the fact that most pages feature 9 amazing images on a huge variety of subjects, it’s also a calming and inspiring sign of how much amazing content is being uploaded onto the internet every second, minute, hour and day. Rather than feeling like the information overload of RSS and Twitter, the chatter of Facebook, or the audio-visual hullabaloo of Youtube, it’s just 9 simple images. No more, no less.

In some ways, it makes me question how complicated we actually need our information filters to be.

And on another level, it just helps me relax for a few moments – and it never takes long before I’m ready to get back to it!

I’ve just been reflecting on a weekend visit by my parents. I’ve been lucky enough to always have a good relationship with them, especially as they’ve always had a particularly youthful taste in music and films, which means we’ve always had some common ground, and we always have a new band or film to recommend to each other.

In the old days, we’ve each end up bringing CDs and DVDs for entertainment, but things have changed:

I played them new music on Last.fm, as recommend by @stephenfry.

We watched some classic Rallycross on Youtube, which we were at when I was a child. (For the record, one of my favourite drivers and cars of all time was the black Audi Quattro of Dimi Mavropoulos, even when he was up against local hero Will Gollop. In those days, the top Rallycross cars were the awesome vehicles which had just been banned from Group B rallying for being too fast!

We looked at recent holiday pictures on Flickr.

And I helped them do some shopping on Amazon, before catching up with a TV programme on iPlayer.

The only mainstream media which we all actually shared in as a family was the original Swedish language Wallander shown on TV (and far superior to the new English-language version with Kenneth Brannagh).

And it all reminded me that laptops, digital cameras, and mobile phones are no longer ‘gadgets’. They’re tools.

A gadget is a small technological object (such as a device or an appliance) that has a particular function, but is often thought of as a novelty. Gadgets are invariably considered to be more unusually or cleverly designed than normal technology at the time of their invention. Gadgets are sometimes also referred to as gizmos. (From Wikipedia)

It’s why I don’t really care when Michael Arrington claims netbooks are underpowered, too small and hard to type on. Or Wired doing a side-by-side comparison of the specs of the Apple iPhone vs the T-Mobile G1.

The specifications of each device only matter to the geeks – the possibilities matter to everyone.

That’s why I’m so excited about the fact Barack Obama is putting investment and accesibility to broadband at the forefront of his recovery plan for the U.S. I only hope the UK’s copying of U.S. policy extends to one of the best ideas, as well as many of the worst, and one of my Christmas wishes for 2009 comes true!

It’s not about processing power or battery life – my backup laptop is old enough to have been upgraded to Windows 98, and just managed to run Open Office and the unfortunately named Gimp. But that’s more than enough for my partner to check her social networks and interact, and for me to run my blogs, do my dayjob, and keep up with everything.

Snow shovel by cindy47452 on Flickr (CC Licence)

It’s easy to get caught up in the excitement and enthusiasm of obsessing over every minute detail when it comes to technology. The iPhone, N97 or G1 show what’s at the cutting edge, but the INQ is at a more accessible price – and the content and value of your emails will be the same whichever device you use.

You can use Myspace, Blogger or WordPress to write a blog, and the message will have the same value (even if I’d always recommend a hosted WordPress blog!).

It’s all about what you’re doing with what is available that counts. Especially if your budget buying is being cut back at the moment – don’t worry about what you can’t afford, but figure out how to maximise what you can do with what you’ve got.

And remember, the days of broadband, a laptop, or an internet-enabled mobile phone being just a gadget are over.