Computer maintenance: keeping your pc in shape

A regular client contacted me yesterday, saying their pc ran into some major error. They said an error appeared on screen, something about a Primary Hard Disk error, and that they don't see Windows appearing. 

I went to check, and at a short distance (an inch) from the pc, I would already hear a strong "clik-clak" sound. That's a sound I don't like to hear coming from a harddisk, it's the sound of a dying (or dead) harddisk. After a more thorough examination, I made my declaration: it's DUMA (Died Upon My Arrival). My client, still unsure of how to react, requested an explanation on what possible cause killed it. 

Well, let me describe it: After opening the Systems Unit enclosure, there's dirt all over, the entire silvery colored flooring is now covered in black dust. Even the cooling fan of the processor is so dirty you could hardly see the heatsink beneath it. I also noticed the interior is a bit hotter than normal, specially the power supply unit.  

Finally, I opened up the power supply unit, push the cooling fan blades a bit, and presto, it could hardly move! The cooling fan is dead also. Without the cooling fan spinning, the entire power supply almost got fried from the excessive heat, which might, in some way, have affected the overall functionality of the systems unit. It's hard to say with finality that this may have directly cause the harddisk to fail, but it's still a factor. The harddisk may have already been manifesting signs of impending failure (The operator mentioned to me that in the morning, the pc already hanged, then return to normal after a reset, then failed again after two hours, permanently).

This is where computer maintenance plays a vital role. Had there been a regular maintenance and checkup of the pc. Dirt might not have accumulated too much as to clogged the cooling fans and to cause it to fail. A regular maintenance would mean the problem might have been detected (or ultimately prevented) at an earlier time, and data would have been backed up.

Oh well, they immediately bought a replacement harddisk, I replaced the cooling fan, had the systems unit given a general overhaul, and of course, installed a new copy of the operating system. But there's one thing you can't replace: the data and files that have been inside the dead harddisk for almost a year. 

Considering a computer maintenance for your pc today? Think about it. :)

History of the World Wide Web

We've been so obsessed and carried away at using the web. From the moment we were introduced to the concept of using the Internet to search and share information, a lot of things have happen. It's more like the internet has its own evolution in motion, from the primitive, stagnant, all-text interface, from what we see now: full of animation, graphics, colors, links, etc.

It would be very interesting to know where it all started, right? So here's what I stumbled into by accident while browsing:

Who invented the World Wide Web
and was recently knighted for it?


Combating the Digital Divide:
Tim Berners-Lee with the original Web browser.

Tim Berners-Lee, the London-born scientist who invented the World Wide Web, was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II on Friday, July 16, 2004. He received the knighthood in recognition of his services to the development of the Internet through the invention of the Web, a system to organize, link and browse pages on the Internet. The Queen made the 49-year-old scientist a knight commander, the second-highest rank of the Order of the British Empire, in a ceremony at Buckingham Palace.

Dubbed the "Father of the Web", he came up with a system over 10 years ago to organize, link and browse net pages. The famously modest man said he was "quite an ordinary person", and although it felt strange, he was "honored". Sir Tim was recently reunited with the machine he used to invent the web when he e-mailed 80 schools from the UN's summit on the information society.

The British scientist, who lives in the US, was told he was getting the unexpected Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire in the New Year honors list a few days ago - by telephone, not by e-mail. He said he never expected his invention would lead to such an accolade.

The physicist created his hypertext program, which was to revolutionize the net, while he was at the particle physics institute, Cern, in Geneva. The computer code he came up with let scientists easily share research findings across a computer network. In the early 1990s, it was dubbed the "world wide web", and is still the basis of the net as we know it.

If Tim Berners-Lee had decided to patent his idea in 1989, the Internet would be a different place. Instead, the World Wide Web became free to anyone who could make use of it. The Internet has many fathers: Vinton Cerf and Robert Kahn, who came up with a system to let different computer networks interconnect and communicate; Ray Tomlinson, the creator of e-mail and the "@" symbol; Ted Nelson, who coined the term hypertext; and scores of others. But only one person conceived of the World Wide Web (originally, Berners-Lee called it a "mesh" before changing it to a "web"). Before him, there were no "browsers," nothing known as "hypertext markup language," no "www" in any Internet address, no "URLs," or uniform resource locators.

Because he and his colleague, Robert Cailliau, a Belgian, insisted on a license-free technology, today a Gateway computer with a Linux operating system and a browser made by Netscape can see the same Web page as any other personal computer, system software or Internet browser. If his employer at the time, CERN, the European Particle Physics Laboratory in Geneva, had sought royalties, Berners-Lee said, he thought the world would have 16 different "Webs" on the Internet today.

Sir Tim recently told the BBC World Service's Go Digital program his invention was "just another program", and that he originally wanted it to help achieve understanding. "The original idea of the web was that it should be a collaborative space where you can communicate through sharing information. The idea was that by writing something together, and as people worked on it, they could iron out misunderstanding." Sir Tim said the honor was an acknowledgement that the net was becoming globally powerful, and not just a "passing trend".

"There was a time when people felt the Internet was another world, but now people realize it's a tool that we use in this world." He added that his knighthood proves what can happen to "ordinary people" who work on things that "happen to work out", like the web. "What's at stake here is the whole spirit in which software has been developed to date," he said. "If you can imagine a computer doing it, then you can write a computer program to do it. That spirit has been behind so many wonderful developments. And when you connect that to the spirit of the Internet, the spirit of openness and sharing, it's terribly stifling to creativity. It's stifling to the academic side of doing research and thinking up new ideas; it's stifling to the new industry and the new enterprises that come out of that."

Sir Tim currently heads up the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Boston, where he is now based as an academic.

Weird and Cool Gadget, Anyone?

I was checking my email right now, hoping one of my clients over the other side of the globe have sent money (and found out they wasn't any, arrrrgh!), when I came across some cool (and weird) links. Just as companies are trying to make people's lives better by designing better computing gadgets, some are more inclined to do the opposite. Either they're late to realize they placed too much "coolness" on the gadget appearance without realizing the overall over efficiency of it, or they simply want their gadgets to stay clean forever (because you will end up displaying it on the cupboard instead of using it!)

Anyway, here they are, do leave me a comment on which one you like best. :)

The World's Weirdest Mice

10 Excellent Tech Gifts for Your Dad or Grad

10 Amazing Gadgets You Can't Get Here

The Stars of SkyMall

10 Cool New Mobile Gadgets

Dirty Dozen Ugliest and Lamest Cell Phones

World's Thinnest Gadgets

The Coolest (and Craziest) Tech Gear and Trends From Computex 2009

I guess there's always something for everthing, cool stuff for cool people, and weird stuff for....

Lost your job? It might be the best thing that happened to you!

At present, with all the problems brought about global recession, a lot of people are getting worried about their jobs. Companies are downsizing, which means massive lay-offs for employees. Have you been one of them lately?

If you're answer is yes, don't sit in a corner and feel despair. I know it's difficult to accept the fact, specially by then you would be thinking how you're gonna settle those bills, how you're gonna send the kids to school, etc. etc.

Let me tell you this: Treat that as an opportunity. You must understand that it's not the end of the world if you lost your job. In fact, if you could try to visualize it, it gonna leave you with an open option to choose whatever money-making ventures that you can get your hands on. There's a lot of opportunities for home-based work and business ventures. You have time in your hands, you are in control as to how many hours you would want to work.

You don't have to be a geek or someone very savvy on computers in order to work on these. All you need in a computer with a fast internet connection (or at least some place you can work with that in hand), and a particular skill, like ability to type, to do online research, or good oral / writing skills. You can search on online jobs and home-based jobs using Google or Yahoo and presto: a whole list of work is up for grabs.

Some advice though: be careful on jobs that requires you to pay for something. Be sure you read all the terms and conditions. There are a lots of work opportunities that doesn't need any form upfront payment to start, so better try those first. Read and understand guidelines on how you're gonna get paid, so that you can prepare for those (I'll try to discuss different payment schemes on my next articles). There are many scams out there so always take precautions.

So who says loosing one's job is such a bad idea. In fact, it may be the best thing that can happen to you. :)

Swine Virus and "Potency " Syndicates

From swine flue to swine virus, bad elements operating net never seem to ran out of wicked schemes. Instead of giving the public a break, they are further tormenting the rising fears and instability of what looks like a near pandemic case. My best remedy is that these guys must be injected with their own dose of the deadly H1N1 virus, at least they might get back to their senses before dying.

Not only that, I'm quite aware of the recent rise as well of potency drugs (my spam box is so full of those... hey I don't need those stuff!!! ;) ), and people out there might not be aware that it is also being taken advantage by syndicates as well to extort cash from other people.

Here are parts of what I read from the current news on cyber crimes:

"...Cyber crooks are capitalizing on influenza fears with torrents of email promising "swine flu" news but delivering malware or dubious offers for potency drugs or penis enlargement.

An alert posted late Thursday at the US Food and Drug Administration also warns that scammers have launched websites hawking bogus products "that claim to prevent, treat, or cure" the H1N1 flu virus.

.....

"Zombie" computers infected with a dreaded Conficker virus that became an online scourge this year are among machines being used to spew flu spam crafted to trick email recipients, according to computer security firm Trend Micro."

......

For those unaware of the Confiker virus, it is one of a series of virus strains that has been intelligent enough to mutate and conceal itself, making it hard to detect and contain. It has also raised fears of a possible world-wide strike on the cyber world last April 1, 2009, though it has not actually happened, raising concerns that it might be hybernating and waiting for another date where no one would guess...

On with the other parts of the news...

"...."The thing making it worse is the misinformation out there about swine flu," Trend Micro threats research manager Jamz Yaneza said Thursday.

"These guys have picked up on all the fears people have. With all the hysteria of swine flu, some people click on these emails."

Subject boxes of spam email feature lines such as "Swine Flu Outbreak!" and "Madonna Catches Swine Flu!" in order to grab people's interest, a tactic referred to by hackers as "social engineering."

......

McAfee said it has also seen keywords "swine" and "flu" used to direct Internet users to a Russia-based website booby trapped with a computer virus.

.......

"They will use any high media event or high impact news story to push their wares including the sickness and misery of others. Stay vigilant and stay safe."

Crime groups involved with Conficker, Storm and other computer viruses that take control of people's machines and weave them into "botnet" armies are most likely behind the flu spam, said Trend Micro global director of education David Perry.

......

"Swine virus has become a computer virus that takes advantage of fear, confusion and the interest for information available on the Web regarding the epidemic to spread mischievous codes, junk e-mails and infect computer equipment," said the firm's director for Latin America, Juan Pablo Castro.

Japan's National Institute of Infectious Diseases warned Thursday that a suspicious Japanese-language email message with an attached file called "information on swine flu" had been circulating in cyberspace.

Those that order online pills from the spam pitches run risks of having credit card information stolen; paying for drugs that are never delivered, or receiving pills they probably shouldn't swallow, said Yaneza...."

So what's the lesson of the day? Be careful when opening emails, specially those with attachments. If you're not sure where it came from, or even if you're not expecting someone you know to be sending you such emails, send those mails to spam or just delete them.

To read the complete article, click here.

Get the Extra Cash you need these Days...

With all the hypes on global recessions and the bad economy, it's really hard to earn some decent bread these days. I came across some tips, and decided I want to share it with you guys. Some may not be applicable in your case, but who knows, in these days, anything that can put some extra cash (as long as it's legal and safe) into ones pocket is sure worth a try...

Sell Your Stuff
- you can sell it online on auction sites like Ebay or Craigslist, or why not organize / join garage sales in your community. You even do it in front of your homes or in the garage. Selling unwanted stuff will not only earn you money, it will also help clear up spaces in your homes.

Be a Shopping Spy
- I have tried that, going to a franchise outlet and pretending to be a customer, then secretly evaluating their services, store cleanliness, crew manners, etc. There are companies willing to pay to some money (plus the money to dine) so that they check on the quality of their outlets. Try asking a friend who is working in these outlets.

Operate a Call Center From Your Home
- Some companies are outsourcing their in-bound/out-bound calls for technical support and desk answering services. If you got good English skills (oral and written), plus willing to be train on the type of services they're offering, then you got a good chance. Scout on these prospective companies online. By the way, you need a phone line and a PC with good internet connection for this one.

Tutor Students
- You're good in academic subjects like Math and English, or do you speak another language? Look for friends who knows of parents who send their siblings to good, expensive schools, and there may be chances of a need of tutors.

Walk the Dogs
- Depending on which community you're in, there are people who are too busy at work to watch over their pets (the expensive ones!), so they would be willing to spare some cash to pay for someone to do it.

Be a Babysitter
- Do I need to say more? What you need is patience and a bit of childish mind.

Write for the Web
- With tons of blogs and article sites out there, do you know that not all blog entries are written by the owners themselves? Because blogs are intended not only as a hobby but as a money making opportunity as well (I'll have another more extensive article on how you can make money by creating and managing your blog soon), many hire bloggers and article writers to do their job. What you need is good writing skills, plus good research skills.

Make Your Hobbies Pay Off
- This is one of the best ways to earn extra cash, because you're enjoying it while doing it. Market yourself by telling friends or perhaps joing groups to be known.

An End to File Sharing?

Talk about the goods and bads on file sharing, here's one current news I got:

"The court has finally issued a verdict in The Pirate Bay Trial: GUILTY – as in guilty of “assisting in making copyright content available”. The court issued a 1 year behind bars verdict for all four defendants (Peter Sunde, Fredrik Neij, Gottfrid Svartholm, and dot com millionaire Carl Lundström) and fines totaling 30 million Swedish kroner (more than $3,600,000).

Here is a breakdown of the court’s decision:
Peter “brokep” Sunde: 1 year in prison, $905,000 in damages.
Fredrik “TiAMO” Neij: 1 year in prison, $905,000 in damages.
Gottfrid “Anakata” Svartholm: 1 year in prison, $905,000 in damages.
Carl Lundström: 1 year in prison, $905,000 in damages.

As you can see, all four defendants were treated as a team, which is quite unusual according to Gottfrid Svartholm’s lawyer, Ola Salomonsson. As a team, the four have to divide the 30 million Swedish kroner fine amongst themselves – the amount may seem quit large, but keep in mind that the prosecution, made up of 17 companies (Warner Bros Entertainment, MGM Pictures, Columbia Pictures Industries, 20th Century Fox Films, Sony BMG, Universal, EMI, Blizzard Entertainment, Sierra Entertainment, and Activision, to name but a few), asked for a lot more than that – it asked for 117 million Swedish kroner.

“The trial of the operators of The Pirate Bay was about defending the rights of creators, confirming the illegality of the service and creating a fair environment for legal music services that respects the rights of the creative community. This is good news for everyone, in Sweden and internationally, who is making a living or a business from creative activity, and who needs to know their rights will protected by law,” IFPI (International Federation of the Phonographic Industry) chairman and chief executive John Kennedy said.

Petr Sunde twittered the following: “Stay calm. Nothing will happen to [The Pirate Bay], us personally or file-sharing whatsoever. This is just a theatre for the media.”

The truth of the matter is that this is not the end of the trial; there will be an appeal (both sides have 3 weeks to file an appeal), there will be other court proceedings, and a final decision may still be years away. Still, losing this first round it is not a good sign for broadband development, for torrent sites and for file sharing. Why isn’t it good for broadband development? Consider this: if The Pirate Bay was found guilty of assisting in copyright infringement, then ISPs (internet service providers) can be taken to court over the same charges as well.

Please note that the court’s decision has no bearing on The Pirate Bay site, only on the 3 co-founders (Peter Sunde, Fredrik Neij, Gottfrid Svartholm) and the dot com millionaire that supported the torrent tracker (Carl Lundström). The Pirate Bay site will go on, Peter Sunde declared. "

I read through enormous comments and feedbacks in forum. Well, the point here is that the judgement above is gonna hold, that would possibly an end to file sharing sites, file sharing softwares, torrents, limewire, bearshare, mp3rocket, morpheus, etc. etc. Looks like big problem for the millions of people out there who have been used to these stuff. On the other hand, it would be considered a big win for those copyright holders and software companies who have been striving to come up with good software (some a bit too expensive though. ;) ), only to find out their software can now be downloaded in some file sharing portal. That would also mean that ISPs and search engine companies would have to change their internal algorithms in order to remove these sites and to detect/prevent other sites from getting into their engine's search index, less they would also be hold accountable for the zillions of legal software only out for free grabs.

I heard the trial is still a long reach from finality, as there would definitely be appeals and more hearings to come, I'll try to get some more developments on this one....

Geek Reviews: wittypedia

If you're not the very serious type of person when surfing the net (many people are too serious they think it's the end of the world if they don't find what they need. ;-)    ), or maybe if you need a break from absorbing too much information from wikipedia, how about a site that presents the funny side of the man's made world?

Enter http://www.wittypedia.com, where you find funny yet interesting articles. 

Here's a glimpse of the links that you can find when you go to that site: 

"Ready to browse? Just use the links on the left menu to;

• Search for articles with Witty Search (top left of the page).

• Click on Funny Articles for a page of finely crafted comedy masterworks... and be annoyed that it was replaced before you got there with a page of our favourite articles.

• Select Random Funny to pick a random page of mirth.

• Ask Witty - want a funny article about something but prefer someone else to dig for the comedy gold lodged in the coal mine within their brains? Then suggest it here.

• Wittypedia - if you're unlucky enough to come across one of the few funny articles that isn't, erm, funny, then you may need to escape quick! Click Wittypedia and be magically returned to the safety of this front page."

They do have frequent updates and a lot of tidbits and "do you know that..." stuff that's gonna make web browsing a lot "funnier". There's even "Ask Witty", that allows visitors to post curious questions. And yes, just like wikipedia, you can create and post your own articles as well (no serious articles allowed!).

So who says an encyclopedia has to be for geeks only?  :-)

Famous People on Google Logo

Since 2002, Google has honored 25 historical people with custom-made versions of the Google logo, displayed for one day on the Google homepage. Judging by the people Google have selected so far, don’t expect any WWF wrestling stars to show up anytime soon. It’s an elite collection of highly influential scientists, artist and architects who have made their mark on human history and culture. Here they are, all 25 of them, in reverse chronological order. René Magritte: (1898 - 1967) Belgian surrealist artist, famous for his often witty and amusing images. Marc Chagall: (1887 - 1985) Russian Jewish modernist artist. He was a pioneer of modernism and one of the most successful artists of the twentieth century. Diego Velázquez: (1599 - 1660) Spanish painter and portrait artist, many of his famous paintings depicting scenes of historical and cultural significance, royalty and notable European figures of the time. Walter Gropius: (1883 - 1969) German architect, founder of Bauhaus and a pioneer of modern architecture. Alexander Graham Bell: (1847 - 1922) Scientist and inventor famous for, among other things, inventing the telephone. Luciano Pavarotti: (1935 - 2007) Italian opera singer, part of “The Three Tenors” and one of the world’s most famous vocal artists. Yuri Gagarin : (1934 - 1968) Soviet cosmonaut who was the first man in space and the first to orbit Earth. Edvard Munch: (1863 - 1944) Norwegian symbolist painter, known for his expressionistic art. His painting The Scream is one of the most recognizable in all art (and indeed the one Google used as basis for the themed logo). Sir Arthur Conan Doyle: (1859 - 1930) British author mostly known for his novels about Sherlock Holmes, one of the most famous fictional characters of all time. Percival Lowell: (1855 - 1916) American astronomer (among other things) famous for his study of Mars and founder of the Lowell Observatory, which after his death discovered Pluto. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: (1756 - 1791) Austrian musical prodigy and one of the most popular classical composers of all time. Martin Luther King Jr.: (1929 - 1968) African American minister, probably most famous for his work against racial segregation and discrimination, which also earned him the Nobel Peace Prize. Louis Braille: (1809 - 1852) The inventor of braille, a widely used reading and writing system for the blind and visually impaired (he was blind himself). Frank Lloyd Wright: (1867 - 1959) American architect and interior designer. The American Institute of Architecture has named him “the greatest American architect of all time”. Leonardo da Vinci: (1452 - 1519) Italian polymath, doing groundbreaking work as a scientist, engineer, inventor, anatomist, painter and more. Often described the archetypal Renaissance man and one of the most widely talented people of all time. Vincent van Gogh: (1853 - 1890) Dutch Post-Impressionist artist and a pioneer of Expressionism. And yes, he’s the one who cut off part of his own ear. Ray Charles: (1930 - 2004) American pianist and soul singer. Rolling Stone magazine ranked him as number two on its list of the 100 greatest singers of all time. Gaston Julia: (1893 - 1978) French mathematician who devised the formula for the Julia set, common for generating fractals. Alfred Hitchcock: (1899 - 1980) British film director and producer, a pioneer of the suspense and psychological thriller genres. He is one of the best-known filmmakers of all time. M. C. Escher: (1898 - 1972) Dutch graphic artist, famous for his mathematically inspired images of impossible constructions and geometric figures. Albert Einstein: (1879 - 1955) German theoretical physicist, best known for his theory of relativity but contributed greatly to multiple fields within physics, for which he also received the Nobel Prize in Physics. He is regarded as one of the most influential people in human history. Michelangelo: (1475 - 1564) Italian painter, sculptor, architect and engineer. Together with Leonardo da Vinci, he is often cited as the archetypal Renaissance man. Pablo Picasso: 1881 - 1973) Andalusian-Spanish painter and sculptor. Famous for (among other things) founding the Cubist movement. He also has one of the longest full names we’ve ever seen. Andy Warhol: (1928 - 1987) American artist and illustrator and a well-known figure in the Pop Art movement. In addition to his many works of art, he is also famous for being the originator of the concept of “15 minutes of fame”. Piet Mondrian: (1872 - 1944) Dutch painter and an important contributor to the abstract De Stijl art movement.

I was browsing for some needed info, when I got hyperlinked to a forum with this thread title: "Microsoft VS General Motors". Out of curiosity (thinking it's some legal case, though I'm sure I haven't heard of some a case in the news), I "flipped" over that page and saw this content:

Microsoft vs. General Motors

At a recent computer expo, Bill Gates reportedly compared the computer industry with the auto industry and stated "If GM had kept up with technology like the computer industry has, we would all be driving $25.00 cars that got 1,000 miles to the gallon.

In response to Bill's comments, General Motors issued a press release stating: If GM had developed technology like Microsoft, we would all be driving cars with the following characteristics:

1. For no reason whatsoever, your car would crash twice a day.
   
   
2. Every time they repainted the lines in the road, you would have to buy a new car.
   
   
3. Occasionally your car would die on the freeway for no reason. You would have to pull over to the side of the road, close all of the windows, shut off the car, restart it, and reopen the windows before you could continue. For some reason you would simply accept this.
   
   
4. Occasionally, executing a maneuver such as a left turn would cause your car to shut down and refuse to restart, in which case you would have to reinstall the engine.
   
   
5. Macintosh would make a car that was powered by the sun, was reliable, five times as fast and twice as easy to drive - but would run on only five percent of the roads.
   
   
6. The oil, water temperature, and alternator warning lights would all be replaced by a single "General Protection Fault" warning light.
   
   
7. The airbag system would ask "Are you sure?" before deploying.
   
   
8. Occasionally, for no reason whatsoever, your car would lock you out and refuse to let you in until you simultaneously lifted the door handle, turned the key and grabbed hold of the radio antenna.
   
   
9. Every time GM introduced a new car, car buyers would have to learn to drive all over again because none of the controls would operate in the same manner as the old car.
   
   
10. You'd have to press the "Start" button to turn the engine off.

Turns out, if you google that title, it was a joke posted in many sites several years ago. ;)

Wet Cellphones (or mobile phones)

I'm sure anyone would feel disgusted when their cellphones drops into something wet, because the chances of making it work again would seem close to impossible. But I came across this news that's quite amazing. Imagine loosing your phone, after a week someone calls you to say he got your phone recovered from... a FISH! Two things that made this story truly interesting: for one, to think your cellphone went inside a fish belly and got back, and... yes, was still usable (the caller manage to use the same cellphone after he got it dried); and second, it's hard to find honest people who would bother returning something that's been long considered forgotten or abandoned.

To read more, get to this link:

Plus, some good tips on saving your wet cellphone: "How to revive a wet cellphone"

Hope these articles would give you something to ponder about cellphones, wet or dry. :)

General clean-up at the store

Another busy day for us...

We had a general cleaning of our store (FYI, we have a store that's divided into two sections: one as a gift shop/boutique, and the other one for electronics supplies) today. We were able to take out a lot of unwanted boxes, plastic containers, plastic bags, papers, and yes, dust and dirt. To my surprise, what used to be a very cluttered, "limited space" work area of mine became more spacious and organized. Well, not a hundred percent organized though, as I still have to re-arranged my table which is littered with spare parts I used for my experiments, papers with student orders (I design electronic project kits for students who buy it), parts containers, and tools.

I can't seem to have it all cleaned up completely, because from time to time students would come in and buy parts. I even have to combine parts and package them into a kit, along with diagrams and descriptions. Before I know it, it's evening already.

Arrgh! That pesky rat has been biting its way into some of my papers. It even chewed on a Styrofoam board that houses the parts I need in my microcontroller designing. Hmm.. maybe I'll lay down that rat sticky trap somewhere near my work area and see if it would work....

Oh well, let's call it a day. I still have to come back here tomorrow to do some more work (have a computer tutorial in the afternoon and a microcontroller-based design to work on).

Tataaa!

Budget Tips 2

I told you I'll drop some more tips, and here it goes....

• Accept a lower standard of accommodation
• Accept generous offers from family and friends
• Account for the entire cost of a meal
• Act early to find child care, since many day-care centers have waiting lists.
• Add extra insulation to your water heater
• Add foods from the other food groups to complete main meals.
• Add the new numbers to your budget—income and expenses
• Add up what you spend for entertainment and make a list of all the different types of entertainment
• Adding up your monthly income is easy, but totaling up all your expenses takes a little more effort.
• Adequate insurance coverage for your life, health, and property is a wise investment.

Till next time.

Budget Tips

Talk about hard times! Everyone sure needs some ways to manage their finances nowadays. Incidentally, I won a bid at RAC (Rentacoder) to create list of 3000 tips and hints on Budgeting. I found some real interesting sites and tips, even got to share my own.

I was thinking, why not share a few tips here on my blog? That would be nice and would sure be helpful for readers out there.

So here's what I'll do, I'll drop a number of tips now and add some more on the next days to come.

Here it goes!!!

• "Cute" items are often useless. Do not buy an item just because it is "cute".
• A beach wedding may need standing-room only (hence no rental chairs or overhead on tents.)
• A budget is not set in stone.
• A budget should never be a financial starvation diet.
• A good budget is a spending plan that includes everything you will spend money on and stays within your income.
• A good budget tells you when it is ok to make a major expenditure.
• A good plan for preparing for little mishaps in life is to build an emergency fund.
• A home swap can be an affordable way to visit another city or even international locations.
• A kitchen or bathroom fan left running for an hour can remove an entire houseful of warm air.
• A little creativity will stretch your budget a long way.
• A rule must be set regarding purchases.
• A small investment in good-quality insulation will go a long way toward conserving warmth. Your local utility company can advise you about the type of insulation needed for maximum energy savings.
• A suite-type hotel or vacation condominium that includes a kitchen can be also prove to be a money-saver.
• A trove of candles in various shapes and sizes but in one color (such as cream or peach) can decorate an entire backyard with a romantic and inexpensive theme.
• A very easy way to buy no-cost airline tickets is to switch from a direct route home on a business-class ticket to an alternate route with a stopover in a city you would like to visit.
• A well-planned budget is when you can tell when it maybe dangerous to make a major expenditure.
• A wise budget includes everything you will spend money on, savings for a 'rainy day', savings for large purchases, giving, savings for kids, and investment for retirement and still stays within your income.
• Accelerate deductions.
• Accelerate your savings.

I'll give you some more tomorrow, and maybe the next day, and maybe the next week, and maybe.....

Seminar Accomplished!

Last night I was still at lost as to how go about my presentation on "Money Making through the Internet". I tried downloading a copy of my previous presentation, one that I presented in another school under the same theme, but realized it wasn't of much help because most of the topics deal mostly on I.T. application. I have a different audience to face, college studs who are taking accountancy and commerce.

After hours of moving back and forth (it's a mannerism I inherited from my Dad!), I was finally able to get something running on my computer. I took a quick glanced at the clock.. what! it's already 2:30 in the middle of the night. After some more typing, I finally got it right, with a few more empty slides to fill in. I need to get some sleep, I thought.....

When I woke up, the clock says: 7:05am. Yeah right, my seminar time is 8:00am and I'm still trying to compose myself. Fast forward...............

I'm still sleepy when I got to the venue, my co-league was already doing the preliminary presentation. Good thing he was assigned to talk for some time, gave me enough time to prepare and to condition...........

That's strange, I didn't felt that nervous when I started my talk, must have already fade away from several minutes of waiting.

Talk, talk, talk, click, click, click... I keep staring at my cellphone time, don't want to go beyond the time. I started around past 9am, ended past 12nn. I didn't even notice the long hours I was presenting. The students seemed to be attentive (what a relief!), listening eagerly to what I'm saying. A day before, I requested that small pieces of paper be made available to students so that they can write down questions instead of having to stand up and speak out (students hate that!). Well, it proved to be the right thing to do: I got several papers with questions....

One asked about how to ensure that when they work online, they get paid and not cheated:
I explained to them the process of escrow, wherein the website who acts as mediator between workers and clients would ask clients to deposit the money which is intended for service rendered. These escrow would remain with the site until the worker would be able to finish the job, with the money in escrow released to them. So even if the client suddenly disappears, money still remains in escrow and would be awarded to the worker later on.

Another question, about sample sites that offer web templates so that they can easily create one with ease. I recommended webs.com, and told them they can search more using google.

Another question, how to advertise one's product on the web. I said it's better that they put up a virtual store to showcase their products. They can also place ads in sites that offer free posting of classified ads like sulit.com.ph

What else can I recall.... ah yes, someone ask about marketing products or inventions, and about being safe from being copied by others. I told them they should have it patented or copyrighted first before they market those products.

Another question was about which money transfer method is best (I explain to them about Western Union, Payoneer, and Paypal). I told them that paypal is best at present because it's most convenient and cheap.

One more question was about disadvantages of E-commerce. Well I told them that it all depends on how much awareness they have about policies on the net, rules and guidelines of online transaction, among others. The more informed and aware they are, the lesser it becomes for disadvantages to pop out.

What a day! Although we finished at past 12, it was like a whole day, or maybe it was because I was too tired (and starved!)

It was a great morning for me, sharing what's new on the Net, and specially giving students actual ideas on how they can start earning on the Net. The best part was the "after part": I got a big treat for lunch.

I'll try to talk about other key topics I discussed during the seminar. I have to go, still a lot of things to do.....

How to Make Money Online: An upcoming seminar

What a way to start my blog!!!

I was invited to present a morning talk to CAC (College of Accountancy and Commerce) at the Universidad de Santa Isabel tomorrow (2.18.09). My talk will focus on how to use the power of the Internet to earn money. In such hard times, I'm sure it would be wonderful to make students realize that they don't have to keep on spending money in Intenet Cafes, but could even make money out of it!

Sound cool? You bet! I'm really busy right now preparing my slides, searching for the latest trends on the net aside from the those that I am already using at present.

Good luck to us all!