What Features Would Improve Facebook Messages?
I just realized today that I send most of my messages to friends and family via Facebook and not via email anymore. I used to send so much email but I go days without sending an email anymore.
I really think that many people check their Facebook more often than they check their regular email. This means that a Facebook message will get to them quicker. I also can see if they had a chance to read it or not based on their Facebook activity.
I just wish Facebook messages had more features. A better list of features would sure make it more usable for sending messages.
What kind of changes would you make to the Facebook Messaging System in order to make it work better?
Finally Make HD Video Calls Over Skype!
This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of faceVsion Technology USA. All opinions are 100% mine.
I like to make video calls with Skype. I like being able to see people and share experiences. In fact, it’s one of the best ways to keep in touch with family is different parts of the world. Video calls on Skype and MSN Messenger have become a part of life for me and my family.
Unfortunately, the video often leaves something to be desired. The little webcam that came with my laptop isn’t that good and it’s hard to find a decent webcam that produces really high quality video. In fact, I was rather surprised to learn that many of the leading webcams out there like the Microsoft Cinema and Logitech Pro 9000 may claim to be HD, but they don’t stream HD over the internet.
This is where the FV touchcam N1 by faceVsion comes in. It’s one of the few webcams out there that offers true HD video streaming over the internet. It does it by having its very own H.264 video encoder built in. In other words, it’s encoding your video in H.264 in real time. This is a big deal because video encoding can be cpu intensive but when it’s done at the hardware level, then it’s seamless to the end user. You can’t have real time streaming of HD unless you have the encoder built into the webcam.
The FV touchcam N1 is actually the first Skype Certified webcam with embedded H.264 encoding, that’s right, the FV touchcam N1 is the first Internet streaming true HD webcam for Skype video calls. It’s sister product is the FV ExpressCombo that provides a great laptop webcam experience through either ExpressCard slot or USB 2.0. For more information check out the faceVision on line store.
When you are ready to buy, the FV touchcam is available through shop.facevsion.com and other value added partners. If you want to save some money, www.shop.facevsion.com is now running a back to school promotion with $10 off any purchase, using the promo code of FVTBTS2 while checkout. That makes it an even better deal.
I just wish I would have had several of these when I was teaching my computer class last semester.
What’s In A High School Computer Class?
A friend was asking me about my experiences teaching computers here the other day, so I thought I’d put up a blog post and share this on Facebook since I’m sure they aren’t the only ones interested in an easy computer class curriculum.
In the second semester of the last school year, I had a chance to teach a computer class to all of the high school students at our small private school. I designed and developed the entire curriculum from the ground up and it was truly an educational experience for both me and my students. I thought going in that the students would be the only ones learning but boy was I wrong when I started realizing how much they already knew and how hungry they were for interesting projects.
I started them out by introducing them to Social Media and making sure they were grounded in at least one social networking site. Next I moved on to Squidoo Lenses. Every student had to make a Squidoo Lens on something that interested them. I wanted to get them writing and sharing about something they were passionate about.
After Squidoo lenses, I introduced them to the world of blogging by sharing some of the more famous blogging sites. I showed them how you could share your views and opinions and also how you could use a blog to make money. John Chow’s blog really struck a cord with some of the boys. For the blogging unit, they had to create a blog, adjust the blog’s theme and then publish several posts on the blog.
Our next project unit was about video. Basically, I divided the class into several groups and they had to produce a 2 minute video of their own creation. I was surprised out how great the quality turned out. I saw a lot of potential in my students from this project.
I added in a unit about Powerpoint just because a couple of the students expressed interest in it, but generally most of the students were a bit bored with it. I allowed them to use to Powerpoint to create a project showing what they had learned over the school year as a final project.
All in all, I’d say it was a great class and while the curriculum wasn’t perfect, it gives a general idea of what to offer in a high school elective computer class.
NMEDA: Helping Disabled People Be More Mobile
This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of NMEDA. All opinions are 100% mine.
Mobility is important for everyone. Can you imagine living your life without your own transportation? Can you imagine how it would be trying to do your daily errands without your own car? People with disabilities face this same problem every day.
NMEDA is the national organization that looks out for those with those with mobility issues. They are focused on promoting safe driving and equipment for disabled people. They are non-profit and don’t sell anything, instead they are focused on helping disabled people.
NMEDA helps people locate local dealers of handicap vans and vehicle modifications that adhere to NMEDA and National Highway Traffic Safety Administration requirements. You can go to their site and enter your zip code and you’ll find the dealer located closest to you. I was a little surprised that there wasn’t one listed for Hawaii but hopefully that will change in the near future. If you want to, go ahead and look at the site and post the one closest to you here in the comments.
More than just providing a link to dealers, NMEDA also has a Quality Assurance Program (QAP) that is focused on ensuring that customers are satisfied consistently through a systematic and documented approach to quality. The NMEDA QAP is the only nationally recognized accreditation program for the Adaptive Mobility Equipment Industry.
If you or anyone you know might be interested in improving their mobility, I suggest that you take a look at the NMEDA site and see how an NMEDA dealer can help them regain their mobility.
My Work With Energy Audits
Filed under: Education and Training, Resources, Science, Small Business, Tech
I am doing a lot of brainstorming about ideas to help companies achieve more through technology in my consulting business. One of the ideas that really seems to be popular with small businesses is my energy auditing.
Basically energy auditing is about looking at a small businesses utility bills and identifying ways that they can reduce their utility bills. I can take a look at their entire business, including the physical part of the property but also their business processes in an effort to identify ways that they can reduce their utility bills by a significant amount.
Not only do companies save money on their utility bills, it’s also a way to help the environment. I’m working on coming up with a way to certify companies as energy efficient and environmentally friendly. That gives companies these energy audits an even bigger incentive to have an energy audit.
My New TEFL Project
It’s break time so that means it’s time for me to get some real work done and get some new sites up and rolling. One of the sites that I am doing is a Freelance TEFL site. Most of it will be new, but a good chunk of it, at least at first, will be a rehash of some of the work I’ve done in the past. The defunct TEFLWatch forum will be resurrected as a base for the Freelance TEFL forum. Some of old school ratings and Hall of Shame postings from the TEFLWatch blog will be resurrected as well.
While none of the work is ready to go live yet, the content is looking good and it won’t be long until I am back helping teachers get ahead.
Cheap and Easy Way to Sell Ebooks
I am in the planning stages of my first ebook. As I put together my plans, I’ve been trying to figure out out how to handle the sales of the book when I am finished. I had looked into Clickbank, but you have to pay to get listed and then it still doesn’t easily handle the sales. I didn’t want to go to the hassles of making my own secure downloads and then putting up a shopping cart. Luckily I discovered E-junkie
Basically, they handle the downloads for the product and they provide a simple shopping cart. This means that you can stick some simple code on your site and people can easily buy the ebook and download it, without any work on your part. They even have affiliate programs built in so that it’s easy to get people selling for you. A big bonus is that their basic fee is just $5 /month. That’s a good deal that is difficult to pass up.
I will certainly be using them when I start selling my ebooks. They make it easy to get started selling digital content.
How To Silk Screen Print Your Own Shirts
I have always been interesting in learning new skills. My wife was talking with me the other day about possibly doing silk screen shirts to sell at the flea market on the weekends for extra money. I always thought that making silk screen shirts would be difficult until I came across this video.
It’s a great tutorial on the process involved in silk screening shirts. The tutorial is pretty straightforward, but I do suggest watching it a couple of times to get in all of the information. There is a lot to take in, but once you do, it’s all good. I suggest trying it out on a few shirts before you think about doing it as a full time business.
Anyways, enjoy the tutorial video.
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