Maybe it's time to start a letter writing campaign? Make your voice heard before this happens. Banks like you keeping your money there, if they start getting letters from members letting them know accounts will be closed before this becomes defacto for online banking it will carry more weight.
If lack of a touchscreen was holding linux back, a procedure that requires cracking something else open, cabling and soldering will not be winning you new converts or my grandmother.
Ding, ding, ding. I fail to see how adding a kludged together touch-screen would be the tipping-point in making Linux have a friendly interface. Is it cool? Yes. Is it the holy grail to making an interface user-friendly? No. That task is still up to application designers.
One thing I've found blogs to be very useful for is to get hands-on reviews of products and services. The tough part is seperating out the wheat from the chaff and learning who's actually interested in writing a review to help other people out and who is being a shill for the manufacturer.
I've posted some reviews of products and services on my own web site (I too don't care for the word "blog") and I've had some good feedback because I am not being paid by anyone for my opinion.
Time is indeed valuable, but where in a professional setting would the equilivent of "lol" be acceptable? I can't think of anywhere I would use that, and in person or in writing most "professionals" would never dream of using that type of reduced language either.
If a person is really so busy as to be bombarded by instant messages non-stop, maybe they should evaluate what percentage are really critical and ignore the rest? That time/money saying is really all about time management!
A great book about Time Management (by the way) is "The Time Trap" by R. Alec MacKenzie.
So it will sound like almost every other meat-head out there using instant messaging? It will blend right in! I have received less comprehendable IMs from people who would consider it a mortal sin to be anything other than professional in person or on paper.
Why does all respect for grammar and spelling (and not sounding like a 12 year old) go out the window when instant messaging technology is involed (especially in a business setting)?
I've been with my company for 5 years and you could fit all the hand written stuff I've done over the past 5 years on a single piece of paper.
How about personal notes, thank you notes, etc? A nicely handwritten note will do a lot more for your career than you ever thought possible.
It takes time to WRITE a note and that gets noticed by the people to whom you write the notes. Make sure you're being sincere though, nothing worse than getting caught at false-flattery.
An while you're writing that note, iron your shirt. I was the king of "casual" and since I've stepped my wardrobe up a notch things have been going insanely well. I'm not talking about a 3-piece suit, try to dress at the same level of your senior management team and you'll start to get noticed quickly if you're in a business casual office and not already required to wear a shirt/tie/suit, etc. If you are, buy something a little nicer than the rank and file, quality really shows when it comes to clothes.
Seriously, buy some nice oxford shirts, take them to the cleaner to be pressed so you look nice and spiffy (i.e. professional) when you deliver your hand written note.
We too are a smallish company (75 employees) and when presenting options to our senior management team for review and approval I like to give them a good, better, best selection.
Good is the bare minimum, it's a throw away solution intended to just get us by while spending the minimum amount of money to get the job done.
Better is a solution that may not be "best-of-breed", but will scale and won't be trashed as soon as our needs/requirements change. It's what I always shoot for when asking for budget knowing that I can usually argue successfully for "better" because no one likes to spend money on disposable solutions.
Best is, well best. Industry best-practice, best-of-breed hardware and software. Usually pie-in-the-sky type stuff. Enterprise level spending goes here. I rarely get it (once in two years) but when I do I feel really good.
When setting department budgets I try to get a feel from our senior management of what IT issues will be business driven in the coming month, quarter, year, etc. and then prepare my budgets for approval using the outline above. 70% of the time I get "better" 29.5% of the time I get "good" and 0.5% of the time I get "best".
Could one survive such a speed (perhaps terminal velocity) / force (negative deacceleration) if he/she were to break the surface tension of the water by shooting a shotgun into it or using something else to make a large splash?
Not according to an episode of Myth Busters from a few months ago. They hauled Buster up on a crane (maybe 150 feet?) and dropped him into water. The deceleration tore limbs off.
Then they rigged it so various large falling objects would hit first (a hammer, bucket of tools, etc.).
At the end of the day he "died" no matter what hit before him. I think the best case scenario they came up with was only one leg being ripped from his torso.
I switched from a WinTel to a Mac a few months ago (not specifically for noise) and immediately noticed a huge difference in sound. Did the mac make noise? Yes. Did it make about 1/16th the noice of my PC? Yes!
I moved my PC out of the office and to the garage to serve duty as the house fileserver. I can once again watch TV in my office without cranking the volume three-fourths of the way to max.
As a side bonus my office got cooler. I was able to take my 450watt PSU and 19" CRT out of the room and it makes it all the more comfortable in the summertime!
Cool and quiet - it's a winning combination! DoublePlusGood; the Mac has a high W.A.F. because it's "pretty."
Assuming you know your job and the skills required to do it, the only thing that really sets anyone apart is the experience they bring to the transaction.
Anyone can uninstall a moutain of spyware, but not many people make sure that the customer really enjoys the expereince of having spyware uninstalled. That is, most often tech don't take time to educate without condescending or to really connect with the customer on a personal level.
I highly recommend the book The Fred Factor by Mark Sanborn (ISBN: 0-385-51351-8). It coveres how to make the expereince you share memorable and that's what builds customer loyalty and sets you apart and makes you "different" than everyone else out there who repairs PCs.
Great - the government will get involved and just fuck things up. For every single good requirement there will be donzens of brain-dead requirements too. A perfect example is C-TPAT (a knee-jerk customers/boarder program in our "post 9/11" world).
My company is currently going through our C-TPAT validation (our audit is Monday actually) and while there are some nuggest of good ideas and practices I've seen in the C-TPAT documentation, there are reams and reams of requirements that you know were stuck in there by some asshat beauracrat with a personal agenda.
So now instead of just doing the smart and sane things we already do we have to pile on a heap of new requirements that are costing us a lot of time and money to implement.
C-TPAT is supposed to make "things" safer, but I've not managed to determine exactly what "things" will be made safer, or how it will happen because now I officially can't smoke in my data center (yes, that's an official requirement).
If you're a serious amateur (why are you printing at Wal*?) then you get to know the kids who work the photo counter. Bring in some samples of your work and chat them up.
If they know you're a serious amateur and they know you they will be happy to print your work. Get to know the people on other shifts too and you'll have no problems. It's just a simple matter of being a little outgoing and starting the conversation while you fill out your order form.
Or check out Mpix - they're all I use anymore. You can read why on my web site, here.
Now get out there and use your social skills and get your pictures printed!
So will MSFT grant windows amnesty for other orgnizations as well? How about individuals?
Can this set any precident for the "value" of MSFT software in general? If someone is caught with pirated software, could this overturn the (potential) $150,000 copyright violation because of this precident?
I assume MSFT knows what it's doing (what with their fleet of lawyers).
I've been a big fan of Apple and their Macintosh line for a long time. Waaaaaay back in the day I was a "Mac Guy" who slowly moved over to WinTel in the mid-1990s (with the odd Mac here and there).
Just receintly I decided I wanted to bring OSX back into my computing life, so I told the wife, "Honey, I'm buying another computer."
Needless to say she wasn't thrilled. She's not really comfortable with computers, and had finally gotten to the point where she was comfortable using Windows XP Pro and didn't have to ask me questions about how to check email, browse the web, type a letter, etc.
So the new 20" iMac G5 arrived and her only comment was, "Well it looks nicer than the other computer."
After about a week of using it (without any questions for me other than how the dock worked) she said to me, "You know, I really like that new computer. It makes a lot more sense!"
Years back (like 1996/1997) I registered the domain name spam.net and ran a site where people submitted funny computer articles that ran along side articles of my own writing.
I ran the site for maybe a year before I received my first C&D letter from Hormel. I replied back telling them I was not attempting to compete and was not dilluting their mark. Basically a nice, "Go to hell, Hormel!"
There were one or two more letters back and forth between Hormel and myself. When I registered the domain you still didn't have to pay for a registration. When Hormel decided they wanted it back you had to pay $100 for two years to InterNIC. I wanted Hormel to at least buy me a new domain since they were starting to threaten litigation if I didn't hand over spam.net (I was 20 at the time, litigation by a LARGE corporation didn't sound like a walk in the park).
Some months later I received a letter from WIPO telling me that Hormel had filed a petition against me and they decided the case was vague enough that they wouldn't give Hormel the name, but I couldn't use it either. InterNIC put the domain name on hold until Hormel and I could sort it out amongst ourselves.
Hormel contacted me once against asking for the name and I told them if I couldn't have it, they couldn't either. I was happy to leave it on hold so NEITHER of us could use it (scorched earth mentality baby!).
They just went away.
I would check on the name from time to time to see if it was still on hold. About 2 months before the payment was due (InterNIC required payment for on hold domains, damn their then-monopoly) I checked on the domain name. I was registered to Hormel, lock stock and barrel!
My plan had been to pay the registration feel just to keep the name tied up, but somehow - and without anyone notifying me - they managed to get the name transfered to them and taken off hold.
At no point had I ever agreed to transfer the name or provided anything in writing that said anything remotely close to it. But there it was, big as day, off hold and in the hands of Hormel.
Do you know if that works?
Looks interesting - If I'm not woken during a light sleep-phase I am completely wasted myself, it would be nice to have something to help;)
It actually does work really well. I bought one (read about my experience here on my blog).
It does sense when I'm mostly awake and starts beeping which fully wakes me up. I'ts still an exercise to pull myself out of the soft, warm, fluffy bed at 6:30 in the morning. Goddamn corporate job, sucking the life right out of me!
Why is a xxx.yyy.pro name worth $345 per year ($595 for 2 years)?
Where is the value over a.com? I say, more power to them if they can convince "professional" organizations to pony up the cash.
I see that some sites offering.pro domains mention an expensive vetting process to determine the authenticity of the registering party. I have to ask, "why?" Where is the value to the end user or to the registering party?
There certianly isn't any value for me (as a professional or as a user) and I imagine these "rules" will be relaxed as some point where.pro will be just another.info or.biz - a TLD I never bother to check for availability when I register a domain.
Then get Group E and tell them they are getting real placebos and give them random pills and then get Groups F through J and give them pills on the second Tuesday of every month and tell them you're uncertain about what the pills are and then get Group K to distribute fake placebos, real placebos and small slices of toast to Groups A, D and G respectively and then tell Group L they're not needed and should just take whatever pills they find at home or on the street. This ensures that Groups B, C, E and J but not C know what they're taking but not really and that people in Group A will think they're in Group D.
Awesome post. I couldn't mod you past +5 so you made a new friend today.
I've been listening to NPR this morning and they seem to be giddy this has transpired. They keep going back to the story and their normally relaxed demanor seems to lift a litte.
Is there no love lost between NPR and Fiorina or is it just that NPR is happy anytime a "big wig" gets the boot?
Slashdot Mirror
Also, does this look like just a modified Zebra printer to anyone else?
Maybe it's time to start a letter writing campaign? Make your voice heard before this happens. Banks like you keeping your money there, if they start getting letters from members letting them know accounts will be closed before this becomes defacto for online banking it will carry more weight.
I've posted some reviews of products and services on my own web site (I too don't care for the word "blog") and I've had some good feedback because I am not being paid by anyone for my opinion.
82.67% of all statistics are made up anyway...
Time is indeed valuable, but where in a professional setting would the equilivent of "lol" be acceptable? I can't think of anywhere I would use that, and in person or in writing most "professionals" would never dream of using that type of reduced language either.
If a person is really so busy as to be bombarded by instant messages non-stop, maybe they should evaluate what percentage are really critical and ignore the rest? That time/money saying is really all about time management!
A great book about Time Management (by the way) is "The Time Trap" by R. Alec MacKenzie.
- lol no this is not a virus
So it will sound like almost every other meat-head out there using instant messaging? It will blend right in! I have received less comprehendable IMs from people who would consider it a mortal sin to be anything other than professional in person or on paper.Why does all respect for grammar and spelling (and not sounding like a 12 year old) go out the window when instant messaging technology is involed (especially in a business setting)?
DDDUUUUUHHHHHHHH!
- I've been with my company for 5 years and you could fit all the hand written stuff I've done over the past 5 years on a single piece of paper.
How about personal notes, thank you notes, etc? A nicely handwritten note will do a lot more for your career than you ever thought possible.It takes time to WRITE a note and that gets noticed by the people to whom you write the notes. Make sure you're being sincere though, nothing worse than getting caught at false-flattery.
An while you're writing that note, iron your shirt. I was the king of "casual" and since I've stepped my wardrobe up a notch things have been going insanely well. I'm not talking about a 3-piece suit, try to dress at the same level of your senior management team and you'll start to get noticed quickly if you're in a business casual office and not already required to wear a shirt/tie/suit, etc. If you are, buy something a little nicer than the rank and file, quality really shows when it comes to clothes.
Seriously, buy some nice oxford shirts, take them to the cleaner to be pressed so you look nice and spiffy (i.e. professional) when you deliver your hand written note.
Hello promotion-city!
Good is the bare minimum, it's a throw away solution intended to just get us by while spending the minimum amount of money to get the job done.
Better is a solution that may not be "best-of-breed", but will scale and won't be trashed as soon as our needs/requirements change. It's what I always shoot for when asking for budget knowing that I can usually argue successfully for "better" because no one likes to spend money on disposable solutions.
Best is, well best. Industry best-practice, best-of-breed hardware and software. Usually pie-in-the-sky type stuff. Enterprise level spending goes here. I rarely get it (once in two years) but when I do I feel really good.
When setting department budgets I try to get a feel from our senior management of what IT issues will be business driven in the coming month, quarter, year, etc. and then prepare my budgets for approval using the outline above. 70% of the time I get "better" 29.5% of the time I get "good" and 0.5% of the time I get "best".
- Could one survive such a speed (perhaps terminal velocity) / force (negative deacceleration) if he/she were to break the surface tension of the water by shooting a shotgun into it or using something else to make a large splash?
Not according to an episode of Myth Busters from a few months ago. They hauled Buster up on a crane (maybe 150 feet?) and dropped him into water. The deceleration tore limbs off.Then they rigged it so various large falling objects would hit first (a hammer, bucket of tools, etc.).
At the end of the day he "died" no matter what hit before him. I think the best case scenario they came up with was only one leg being ripped from his torso.
The only "day" I can remember is Avogadro's day because 6.02 x 10^23 was DRILLED into my skull by my high school chem teacher.
Maybe all these "days" could be posted in advance or turned into a Hallmark card or something. I can't remember them all!
Mmmmmm, planet Gazpacho - the coldest planet of them all...
I moved my PC out of the office and to the garage to serve duty as the house fileserver. I can once again watch TV in my office without cranking the volume three-fourths of the way to max.
As a side bonus my office got cooler. I was able to take my 450watt PSU and 19" CRT out of the room and it makes it all the more comfortable in the summertime!
Cool and quiet - it's a winning combination! DoublePlusGood; the Mac has a high W.A.F. because it's "pretty."
Anyone can uninstall a moutain of spyware, but not many people make sure that the customer really enjoys the expereince of having spyware uninstalled. That is, most often tech don't take time to educate without condescending or to really connect with the customer on a personal level.
I highly recommend the book The Fred Factor by Mark Sanborn (ISBN: 0-385-51351-8). It coveres how to make the expereince you share memorable and that's what builds customer loyalty and sets you apart and makes you "different" than everyone else out there who repairs PCs.
My company is currently going through our C-TPAT validation (our audit is Monday actually) and while there are some nuggest of good ideas and practices I've seen in the C-TPAT documentation, there are reams and reams of requirements that you know were stuck in there by some asshat beauracrat with a personal agenda.
So now instead of just doing the smart and sane things we already do we have to pile on a heap of new requirements that are costing us a lot of time and money to implement.
C-TPAT is supposed to make "things" safer, but I've not managed to determine exactly what "things" will be made safer, or how it will happen because now I officially can't smoke in my data center (yes, that's an official requirement).
<sarcasm>
Yea goverment involvement
</sarcasm>
If they know you're a serious amateur and they know you they will be happy to print your work. Get to know the people on other shifts too and you'll have no problems. It's just a simple matter of being a little outgoing and starting the conversation while you fill out your order form.
Or check out Mpix - they're all I use anymore. You can read why on my web site, here.
Now get out there and use your social skills and get your pictures printed!
Can this set any precident for the "value" of MSFT software in general? If someone is caught with pirated software, could this overturn the (potential) $150,000 copyright violation because of this precident?
I assume MSFT knows what it's doing (what with their fleet of lawyers).
Just receintly I decided I wanted to bring OSX back into my computing life, so I told the wife, "Honey, I'm buying another computer."
Needless to say she wasn't thrilled. She's not really comfortable with computers, and had finally gotten to the point where she was comfortable using Windows XP Pro and didn't have to ask me questions about how to check email, browse the web, type a letter, etc.
So the new 20" iMac G5 arrived and her only comment was, "Well it looks nicer than the other computer."
After about a week of using it (without any questions for me other than how the dock worked) she said to me, "You know, I really like that new computer. It makes a lot more sense!"
I ran the site for maybe a year before I received my first C&D letter from Hormel. I replied back telling them I was not attempting to compete and was not dilluting their mark. Basically a nice, "Go to hell, Hormel!"
There were one or two more letters back and forth between Hormel and myself. When I registered the domain you still didn't have to pay for a registration. When Hormel decided they wanted it back you had to pay $100 for two years to InterNIC. I wanted Hormel to at least buy me a new domain since they were starting to threaten litigation if I didn't hand over spam.net (I was 20 at the time, litigation by a LARGE corporation didn't sound like a walk in the park).
Some months later I received a letter from WIPO telling me that Hormel had filed a petition against me and they decided the case was vague enough that they wouldn't give Hormel the name, but I couldn't use it either. InterNIC put the domain name on hold until Hormel and I could sort it out amongst ourselves.
Hormel contacted me once against asking for the name and I told them if I couldn't have it, they couldn't either. I was happy to leave it on hold so NEITHER of us could use it (scorched earth mentality baby!).
They just went away.
I would check on the name from time to time to see if it was still on hold. About 2 months before the payment was due (InterNIC required payment for on hold domains, damn their then-monopoly) I checked on the domain name. I was registered to Hormel, lock stock and barrel!
My plan had been to pay the registration feel just to keep the name tied up, but somehow - and without anyone notifying me - they managed to get the name transfered to them and taken off hold.
At no point had I ever agreed to transfer the name or provided anything in writing that said anything remotely close to it. But there it was, big as day, off hold and in the hands of Hormel.
I've been a little bitter about it ever since.
- Do you know if that works?
;)
It actually does work really well. I bought one (read about my experience here on my blog).Looks interesting - If I'm not woken during a light sleep-phase I am completely wasted myself, it would be nice to have something to help
It does sense when I'm mostly awake and starts beeping which fully wakes me up. I'ts still an exercise to pull myself out of the soft, warm, fluffy bed at 6:30 in the morning. Goddamn corporate job, sucking the life right out of me!
Where is the value over a .com? I say, more power to them if they can convince "professional" organizations to pony up the cash.
I see that some sites offering .pro domains mention an expensive vetting process to determine the authenticity of the registering party. I have to ask, "why?" Where is the value to the end user or to the registering party?
There certianly isn't any value for me (as a professional or as a user) and I imagine these "rules" will be relaxed as some point where .pro will be just another .info or .biz - a TLD I never bother to check for availability when I register a domain.
That 95% not-on-time rate is for Canadian I.T. projects. So once you factor in the conversion it's only 78% for US I.T. projects.
- Then get Group E and tell them they are getting real placebos and give them random pills and then get Groups F through J and give them pills on the second Tuesday of every month and tell them you're uncertain about what the pills are and then get Group K to distribute fake placebos, real placebos and small slices of toast to Groups A, D and G respectively and then tell Group L they're not needed and should just take whatever pills they find at home or on the street. This ensures that Groups B, C, E and J but not C know what they're taking but not really and that people in Group A will think they're in Group D.
Awesome post. I couldn't mod you past +5 so you made a new friend today.Is there no love lost between NPR and Fiorina or is it just that NPR is happy anytime a "big wig" gets the boot?