If you're sick of hefty cable bills eating chunks out of your checking account, it's worth taking a look at free online services to see if you can save some cash. Use BillShrink to save money on cell phone and credit card bills and to compare gas prices and rates on CDs and savings accounts. The site takes your usage patterns into account when finding the best rates for you and claims to save the average user $1500. At My Emissions Exchange, input your home utility usage from your bills, and once you reduce your home energy use, the site sells your savings as official "carbon credits" and gives you cash. Web app billQ lets you track and organize your bills, reminds you when you need to pay them, and creates reports to help you understand where your money's going. (The basic service is free; premium is $5/month or $50/year.) WhiteFence helps you negotiate with utility companies via the internet--you don't have to call and haggle with a customer service rep, because this site does it for you. You can also compare TV, internet, phone, and other service providers side by side and get deals on other things like newspaper delivery and appliance rental. And if you split your bills with someone else, like a roommate or friend, BillMonk helps you keep track and do it easily.

The Oscars are ramping up their online presence this year in an attempt to attract more viewers. That means more fun stuff online for movie lovers. First of all, you can watch the Oscars online at the official site, Oscar.com--and building up to the actual event, they have tons of other video available now, including the trailers for all the nominated films. There are also widgets for making predictions. The Oscars YouTube channel has plenty of video as well (we know you've always wanted to see how an Oscars statuette is made!). E! Online will have video live from the red carpet, so you won't miss what anyone's wearing. The Official Academy Facebook page has a large collection of photos and a Livestream channel where you can share your thoughts with other Facebook users watching.

Making phone calls via the web can save a lot of money, and in many cases, it's completely free. Considering shedding your landline or just want to give the technology a try? Check out these services. Skype is the best-known service--free if both you and the person you're calling are on Skype, or call mobile phones and landlines at low rates. To use it, download free software to your computer. iCall lets you make free calls using downloaded software, your iPhone or iPod Touch, or a web browser. EvaPhone lets you make free international calls from your PC. With Jajah, make low-cost calls using your own phone, but you need to initiate the process on your computer; Jajah is partnered with Yahoo! Voice, offering similar services and free internet calling. A few other fun phone resources online: Make conference calls at FreeConference.com or Rondee.com (which also lets you schedule the calls via the web), video chat with ooVoo, get free wake-up or reminder calls with Snoozester, and send text messages from the web with txtDrop. And finally, Google Voice (okay, that's 11 but this one is only available by invite for now) gives you voicemail like email, the ability to read your voicemails via email or SMS, and one number you can forward to all your phones.

What's your favorite free phone service?

All right, so maybe all the coverage isn't quite as good as being in Vancouver...but at least you'll stay warm when you check out the Olympics online! As with the Super Bowl, you can't watch officially watch the entire Olympics online. Still, check out NBC's 2010 Winter Olympics Online for video and a cool interactive competition schedule. There's more video at the official Winter Olympics 2010 site, Vancouver 2010, and on Yahoo! Sports. Want to (try to) interact with Olympians directly? Here's Twitter's list of verified Olympic athletes...and who knows, maybe some of them will make an appearance at Facebook's Vancouver 2010 fan page. If you're lucky enough to be at the Olympics or want to see snapshots from those who are, check out the Olympics Flickr Photo Group. You can also catch some of the action on your phone: ReadWriteWeb rounds up the best Olympics iPhone apps (official and non-), and iPhone Hacks has a few more. Finally, plenty of bloggers are covering the Olympics; some of the best are the NY Times' Rings, the Vancouver Sun's Inside the Olympics, FanHouse, Luke Winn at the Winter Olympics, and Newsweek's Ring Cycle.

Apple announced it's new tablet computer in January and everyone's got questions. Here are the most important ones (for now) answered.

What Is It? The Apple tablet is called the iPad. "Quite simply it works like a hybrid between an iPhone and a full laptop," explains MTV Multiplayer. "Using the touch screen, you can browse the internet, use apps, listen to music, watch movies and play games. It won't be able to make calls, but given the size, that's probably for the best." The iPad will be able to run all iPhone apps; more interesting, says Yahoo! Tech, "is the potential for app developers to build apps that take advantage of the iPad's jumbo display." The iPad has the potential to become the go-to e-reader--Apple also announced the new iBooks app and the iBookstore, where readers can download digital titles from large publishers. This should make the "the Kindle and its once-rivals shake and shudder at their bezels," says Ubergizmo.

When it's already dark at 4 PM and snow and wind are shaking the windowpanes, don't hide in bed and wait for spring--let there be light right now with these gadgets, which will chase the winter blues away.

A few online tools to make your day-to-day life easier: Backup all your online accounts (Facebook, Twitter, Wordpress, Flickr, etc.) with Backupify--sign up free through January 31. Online backup tool Carbonite backs up your entire computer and stores your stuff securely online ($54.95/year for unlimited backup). Use animoto (free) to create really good-looking video and photo slideshows. Tripit is an online travel itinerary and trip planner--e-mail all your travel confirmation e-mails to Tripit, and the site organizes them into a master travel itinerary. Mobile app Waze provides turn-by-turn navigation based on live road conditions and is entirely crowd-sourced. Hunch helps you make decisions ("Should I buy a Mac?" "Which religion should I consider?"), providing based on the collective knowledge of the community, and improves each time it's used. And Dorthy, "the first topic-based social network," can help you keep your New Year's resolutions: Users create "dreampages," and each page searches the web for relevant content.

Related: Digital Ways to Declutter Your Life

Cutting your cable subscription doesn't mean you have to miss your favorite shows. There are more ways than ever to watch TV online; we've outlined our ten favorites below. Best of all, lots of content is completely--and legally--free. 

It only takes a few minutes to help out your favorite cause online. At The Extraordinaries, take just a few minutes to complete a micro-task for a cause you're passionate about (for example, tag photos for a museum or help map kids' playspaces) via your mobile phone or computer. Here's to doing good while you wait in the checkout line! At Do Something, pick a cause (like animal rights, poverty, or violence and bullying), then just answer a couple easy questions (who they want to volunteer with, where, and for how long--even if it's online-only and just for a minute) and the site generates a list of ways to take action. While the site's aimed at teens, anyone can find ideas here. JustGive is a charity search engine, searching 1.5 million charities to help you find the perfect place to make your donation; you can also give charity gift cards and create a charity wedding registry. Want to take your career in a new direction? Idealist.org is Craigslist for doing good: Search for job listings at nonprofits and find internships and volunteer opportunities (and if you already work at a nonprofit, consider participating one of idealist.org's nonprofit career fairs).

When you perform searches at the Yahoo-powered EcoSearch, you help plant trees in the Amazon. replyforall creates a customized e-mail signature based on your cause of choice. When you play the word game at FreeRice, for every right answer, the site donates 10 grains of rice to the United Nations World Food Programme. And finally, you may know about them already but a reminder won't hurt: Click once a day at the Breast Cancer Site, Hunger Site, Child Health Site, Literacy Site, Rainforest Site, and Animal Rescue Site. Who knew a break at work could help you do so much good?

The hilarious Let's Panic! is written by mom bloggers Alice Bradley (finslippy) and Eden Kennedy (Fussy and yogabeans!) and is "the only website that accurately explains the journey from morning sickness to third-degree tears to keeping that baby alive for a year-or more!" The Baby Name Wizard is all about "the art and science of baby names," and we especially love the NameVoyager, which takes a close look at name trends over the years. . The Bump, a site for first-time parents from the creators of The Knot, provides pregnancy info, baby registry resources, pregnancy checklists and journals, and more. Trixie Tracker is a baby tracker (diapers, naps, feedings, and more) for the web and iPhone. And TotSpot lets new parents create private websites and blogs (with photos, videos, and more) for their kids.

Related: Top 10 Wired Dad Blogs