Thursday, January 28, 2010

Going Green without Spending Green

We have this mistaken idea that to go green, we have to spend green dollars. Well, actually, you do not need to strain your budget just to adopt an eco-friendly lifestyle. In fact, you will be fattening up your wallets with these tips on going green without spending your green dollars. And trust us, these ways are easy, effective and convenient.

Reduce Food Waste

Your grocery bill may constitute more than 50 percent of your total household bills. Thus, any and all efforts to reduce food waste will add up to big benefits to your pockets and to the environment for many reasons. You can achieve this end by:

* Reducing your food consumption in terms of shopping for groceries.
* Using leftovers for new dishes and enforcing a no-dregs policy
* Planning meals in advance to avoid too many leftovers

Use Heaters Wisely

We are so dependent on hot water for many of our needs from washing our bodies to washing our dishes and clothes. Well, go green by choosing cold water for many activities in the house. Start by taking cold showers when the weather permits instead of hot tub baths. Then progress into using unheated tap water for washing your hands, dishes and clothes. Studies have shown that tap water is just as effective in killing germs as hot water. The trick is in washing your hands properly for 20 seconds, soaking the clothes for 30 minutes to remove stubborn dirt and washing off the dregs on the eating utensils before placing on a full dishwasher.

Unplug the Appliances

You can save as much as 10-15 percent of your electricity bill simply by unplugging the cords from their sockets when these are not in use. This is because so-called phantom electricity does not flow from the grid into your appliances. And speaking of appliances, you can save money by either buying ones with the Energy Star logo or ones that have been refurbished. Of course, make sure that the refurbished appliances are also energy-efficient. You ought to save money in the long run instead of sticking to your run-down appliances. However, do recycle said old appliances with the manufacturers or with the recycling centers.

Use Recycled Materials for Your Home

As much as possible, use recycled materials for your home. You can purchase scrap lumber from hardware stores, vintage wood and glass panels from garage sales and old houses, utensils and ornaments made of recycled materials from green stores and sites, to name a few options. You will often spend less on these items and yet get as much mileage as you possibly can from them. Better yet, you should adopt the motto of environmentalists everywhere - reduce, reuse and recycle. You will soon find that indeed being eco-friendly has its rewards for you and for your children's children.

Starting today, take a look around your home and see what else needs to be done to be as environmentally-friendly as possible.



Read about ways to start going green in the kitchen and more about the different ways to recycle.

Choose A Backup Software For Your Data Center Disaster Recovery Plan

A data center stores all the programs, files, applications and other digital information that a business needs to have, so they may reasonably compete against businesses using the internet. If their files where destroyed, this would bring the companies production to a halt, possibly causing a crushing blow to its positive cash flow. This is why it's absolutely critical to invest time and money in a reliable data center disaster recovery plan.

If you are already convinced that you must protect your data, then the next question is what exactly are we supposed to look for in a data center disaster recovery plan anyway?

It does not matter if you are a huge multinational corporation or a new business just entering your fast growth phase. Every business needs a first rate computer backup system.

Computer backup systems are a part of data center disaster recovery plans because they play the major role of safeguarding the pertinent data that keeps your business alive and restoring that data if a computer hardware failure occurs. Because of the importance of its function, selecting the right computer backup program is critical to your data center's disaster recovery plan.

Listed below are several facts to consider during your search for the best computer backup system:

Protection: How many levels of safety does the program have? Does it have a proper administrative login procedure? Can it keep your files intact in its own "vault" so they cannot leak out, get misplaced, or become erased? Determining what the program's security system can and cannot do is vital in making a selection. The program you want to choose must be capable of top-rate security.

Ease of Access: Even though you're backed up files have to be secure, at the same time they should be easily accessible. This encourages frequent updates and simplifies documentation procedures. An accessible system boosts the businesses efficiency, allowing more time to work on other important issues and responsibilities.

Storage Space: Storage pace is always a big issue for online computer backups. Even a small mom and pop business can have an amazing amount of data that needs to be stored. It's vital to know all your storage options and the limitations of your online computer backups, so you can confirm if it can, in fact, handle all or your valuable data.

Ease of Use: It isn’t a must-have requirement, but an easy to understand and operate program is a big plus for a number of reasons. A simple but effective program will be operated, verified, backed up, and given quality control checks more often. This minimizes the risk of file recovery disaster and increases the likelihood of a full recovery from computer crashes.

Dependability: Another important point to look for is if the program can store and restore your data completely when asked too without having to jump through any hoops? You should make sure it is easy to restore your data.

Don’t include yourself as one of the many businesses that do not pay enough attention to their data center disaster recovery plans. Neglecting to check if your computer backup system is up to restoring a file recovery disaster is going to be a painful experience when you most need it.

At all times you have to remember that depending on which computer backup system you select, it will make or break your data center disaster recovery plans. So be sure to take your time and pick wisely.


Data Center Migration

Data center migration services

Wednesday, January 20, 2010

Obama Energy Stimulus Package

President Barack Obama has put into effect a plan that will soon bring a part of the huge change he promises to bring our great country. The plan is a $825 billion economic stimulus package. A percentage of this package, equaling tens of millions of dollars, will be used to revamp the electricity industry; moving it towards a more "Green" enterprise.

An added bonus of this greener enterprise movement is the creation of nearly 500,000 jobs for Americans. These jobs are in no way going to be outsourced to foreign workers. These jobs are related to weatherization and insulation projects on over 2 million homes in the United States such as the sealing of windows, doors, and air ducts in homes, the creation and installation of insulated glass windows as well as producing radiant barriers in attics to counteract the heat of the suns rays. President Obama will not focus only on homes but also improve the efficiency of many federal buildings across the Nation.

Portions of the United States have been fortunate to take advantage of already installed green energy producers to power their families' home. In the West and Southwest both, companies like Green Mountain Energy are able to provide renewable energy sources at premium rates. Thus far, the majority of the country does not have a way to tap in to this wonderful opportunity. The stimulus plan that Obama is putting into affect will also provide for the buidling of several thousand miles of power lines to send energy collected from wind and solar farms to the rest of the country.

A huge benefit to producers of green energy and efficiency companies is that they can reap huge benefits that they were never able to achieve prior. Many times in the past, presidents have given huge tax cuts to try and help companies through rough economic times. Green companies do not have the large tax bills, so cutting taxes is not a viable way for them to prevail through this recession. The stimulus package is going to direct certain monies directly towards the green industry; in return creating jobs, improving efficiency while cutting dependency on foreign oil and allowing American families to use less energy and save more money.

Abigail Smith is a representative of Green Collar Operations. For more information on rebates, energy audits, and energy efficiency in Austin, TX, please visit http://www.greencollaroperations.com or call 512-986-7045

Get your Economic Stimulus Package Bill news at iTaxRebate.com

Wednesday, January 13, 2010

Comparing Online LPN Nursing Schools

Once you have made the decision to pursue an LPN degree online, it's time for comparing online LPN nursing schools. A few factors should go into your decision, such as your needs and career goals. The following information will help you in the process.

Accreditation

One primary factor when comparing online LPN nursing schools is accreditation. Any school you choose should be accredited by one of the primary nursing professional organizations. These are The National League of Nursing Accreditation Commission and The Commission on Collegiate Nursing Education (CCNE). Because an LPN program prepares you for state certification, this accreditation is essential. Your state may not accept an LPN degree from a non-accredited organization. Many schools post accreditation information on their websites. You can also contact these organizations directly. Before enrolling, be sure that your state will accept the program for preparation to take the NCLEX licensing examination.

Rankings and Reports

Another way for comparing online LPN nursing schools is by finding out how other organizations rank the school as well as the school's information on graduates. The U.S. News and World Report ranks many colleges including online nursing programs. This one place to look for information. However, keep in mind that rankings are only one way to determine a school's worth. Additional information you should try to obtain from the school is about its graduates. For example, you may be able to find out how many students pass the NCLEX examination on the first attempt and how many are employed. This information can give you a good idea of how well prepared you will be following graduation.

Word of Mouth

Comparing online nursing LPN schools by talking to those who have attended these programs is another way to learn more about each. If you are a member of a professional nursing organization, you can inquire about online programs. Other tools on the Internet, such as newsgroups, can also provide additional information on the best online LPN programs. One of the best ways to learn about a school is by talking to those who have been there.


Online LPN Programs

Online LPN Nursing Programs

Monday, January 11, 2010

iTunes Fails In Motorola Rokr Cell Phone Bid

Marrying iTunes capability with Motorola Rokr cell phones was theoretically quite sound.

MacNewsWorld has reported, however, that the new Rokr phones by Motorola are proving to be virtual hot potatos.

The mobile phone return rate is roughly six times the usual for these new iTunes phones, according to the article.

Apparently storage has proven to triumph over functionality with consumers, leaving them blindly apathetic to the over-hyped MPEG-4 playback of these devices.

The Rokr iTunes phone only stores roughly 100 songs, a tiny portion of the relatively gigantic iPod storage capability.

Pocket PC owners fortunate enough to have SDIO slots are laughing by comparison, albeit hobbled by a one gigabyte secure digital card.

Couple it with the fact that quite a few PDA cases can store an additional SD card, and it's easy to see what occurred.

Presumably, mobile phone owners simply couldn't stand the combined pointing and snickering of the iPod and Pocket PC masses.

When Pocket PC owners are bedazzling you with their devices' versatility and fifth generation video iPods are becoming increasingly commercially ubiquitous at the same time, a swap is definitely in order.

Throw on a Pocket PC iTunes counterpart like PPCTunes by the PocketMac Team, and you're off to the PDA races with iPod-like functionality, adding serious insult to injury.

If PPCTunes really does halve the storage space that iTunes music files occupy on your device like it claims (I've admittedly haven't tried this download yet-- too busy gaming), this completes this sorry picture of mobile Motorola emasculation.

Apple blames a poor marketing campaign, but it really seems like a case of bad timing with the video iPod newcomer knocking the Rokr to its knees.

I'm opting to stick with Windows Media Player on my iPAQ for the time being.

Damian Julien is a Pocket PC gaming authority and long time general gaming hobbyist and reviewer.

He is an IT specialist by trade and has posted numerous articles on Pocket PC emulators, gaming and trends in the industry.

http://www.pdagameguide.com/


Bestel iTunes Gift Card.

Monday, January 4, 2010

Why Content is Still King - Effective SEO Tactics

It was a year ago that I attended my first search engine strategies conference. It was also at this conference that I became a speaker.

Search Engine Strategies and PubCon are undoubtedly the two largest SEO/SEM conferences out there today so of course there’s huge attendance and lots of big industry names attending.

There’s also a guy there who you may have heard of. His name is Barry Schwartz and he’s from Search Engine Round Table. I bring his name up because he’s found one of the best ways to not only build an ever expanding content base up, but also a way to build quality relevant links. And it’s so simple one begins to wonder why others don’t do it.

Before I get into what he’s doing let me give you a little history. He started covering SES a few shows ago and would post summaries of the various seminars he attended at the SearchEngineWatch forum.

His posts were some of the most read posts during the conference. He soon also began posting longer summaries at his own site. Also very well read by those of us who couldn’t attend the show.

Now he’s become “the” reporter for the SES shows wherever they are. He even went into this one with a plan to cover as many of the sessions as possible, between himself and others known in the SEM industry. Some of the posts end up at the SEW forums but he also posts many on his own site.

Step one – there’s that ongoing content development.

You see, what the folks at SEO roundtable are doing is creating very long, but very detailed summaries of every seminar they attend. They then post these to their website daily or more often. Each post occupies it’s own static page, and most pages are well linked within the site.

Step two – relevant quality links and lots of them

Now here’s the great part. It is because of this coverage that people have come to realize that this site is the site to go to for SES coverage. Between this site and the SEW forums you can pretty much get your fill of SES in a very compact version. (Trust me for some of the sessions, a light summary is much better than sitting through 90 minutes of dry explanations of how ranking algorithms work :) ).

And because people rely on these summaries of the show that they begin to refer others to them. Either through word of mouth or, more importantly, links.

This is where the relevant quality links kick in. What is a link to an SEM site from another SEM site worth? What would you pay to have your competitors link to you with lots of one way links, many from high authority sites? Because of this article, they even have a link from here.

Plus they get links from Searchenginewatch, in both the forums and the blog entries, not to mention other high profile industry sites. What’s link from Matt Cutt’s blog with a photo worth to this site?

You see, this site is building its online reputation the way everyone needs to – by posting relevant timely information that others want to see. Then the others link to that content in a natural way.

Let me put it to you another way – of the over 3,000 links this site has, how many do you suppose are from content? More specifically, how many are due to the site’s summaries of the various SES shows they’ve attended? Links may not be directly to the topics in question. In fact many are not.

In fact, if you scan through the top 100 links or so listed in Google you see a virtual who’s who of the SEO industry. Let me point out a few of the more notable links: Links from Yahoo Search Blog, as well as the MSDN MSN search blog. Of course there’s many from Searchenginewatch, but also from other industry sites like searchviews.com, seomoz.com and searchenginejournal.com just to name a few.

So what has the site accomplished by attending all the SES shows since late 2003? Well, they’ve built lots of good content which helps relay their authority status to engines like Google.

Further, they’ve gotten lots of quality inbound links from high profile related sites that are also considered authorities. Plus they’ve also built a reputation for being the place to go to find out about SES which means increased traffic to the site. Not to mention that they’ve now probably got a well known brand.

In other words, if someone doesn’t already know how to find the site, but they know the name of it, a the person will search on an engine like Google looking for the domain name. Even if it’s ranked #7 or 8 for the search term the site will get the click because the searcher is looking for that brand.

How’s that for building quality content and links at the same time?


Bourne SEO offers Web Design in Sussex and other services.

Sunday, January 3, 2010

Debt Reduction Program And Slowing Your Spending

The best idea available to any individual or business for debt reduction program is to slow your spending. There are two important factors to be remembered for debt reduction and slowing spending. First one is commen sense - Stop adding to your debts. If you continue to rack them up, you may never get out of them in the first place. You will also need some extra money left on the table each month to pay off your debts quicker. This is where slowing spending can help.

Businesses that provide products and services already have a lot of information about you. This information is stored and tracked based on what you eat, where you shop, products and services you buy. Based on this information, they continue to send emails and flyers to entice you into spending further. They try every possible way of making it easy for you and eventually you will get into the downward spiral of debt. These businesses will also go a step further to provide you with credit cards and personal loans.

So what do you do?

You will need quiet some effort and planning. You will also need to budget your purchases. Think hard for a few minutes before you actually make the purchase and ask a few questions to youself whether you really need that nify gadget / product or service.

You must define a purchase checklist and when you are about to make a purchase revert and re-read the questions in the checklist.

What is the price for the product / service?
Is this a regular price or a sale price?
If this is a sale price, how much am I saving over the regular price?
Do I really need it?
Can I cough up the cash to buy it today?
If not, where will the money come from?
If credit, what will be the credit cost?
If the credit costs are factored in, is it worth it?
Does the purchase really fill a need or want?
Can I justify this purchase to a friend?
Would I accept these reasons from someone else?

The above simple questions will help in slowing you down on your newer purchases. Try not to rack up any credit card debt along with the purchase. It does take little extra work but is very well worth in the end. Now with the money you save, work on your debt reduction plans. Take each debt at a time and work hard on reducing and eliminating it.


Kristy Sinsara

Kristy Sinsara

A Guide To Hypnosis

There are many stories about hypnosis and hypnotherapy being dangerous, turning people into chickens, people not being able to wake up, and unscrupulous hypnotists exploiting their 'vulnerable' patients. However there are many people who are adamant that it has helped change their lives, helping them succeed in their goals. Millions of people swear that it has helped them with many issues such as weight loss, quitting smoking, other addictions, confidence, phobias, stress, success, IBS, and many more issues.

Many people are missing out on this powerful yet safe therapeutic tool because they are too afraid to use it. I hope to dispel these fears by answering these common questions about hypnotherapy.

Can I be hypnotized? Most people can go into a hypnotic trance. The only types of people that cannot be hypnotised are ... 1. Those suffering from psychosis or a thought disorder 2. A person with a low IQ 3. A person does not want to be hypnotised. It is very easy to resist hypnosis if you want to. What is a hypnotic trance? It is a normal and natural state that most of us experience several times a day. It commonly happens when people are driving. Have you ever driven somewhere and not really remembered the journey? It also often occurs when reading a book or watching TV. Sometimes you can be so absorbed in the book or TV programme that you are not consciously aware that someone is talking to you. Hypnosis is the focussing of the conscious attention in such a narrow corridor of influence. The conscious mind is so intensely focussed that other influences are not being critically analysed by the conscious mind. We still hear them, although we are not always aware. A good example of this is when you are in a place where there are several conversations going on at once. They may all sound like a mass of background noise. However if someone in one of those conversations mentions your name, you then consciously focus on that conversation. How did you know someone said your name? Your subconscious mind (which is far more powerful than your conscious mind) was listening to EVERY conversation AT THE SAME TIME! That is perhaps a reason why you can sometimes "just know" something. Your subconscious mind has absorbed it without you consciously being aware.

What does hypnosis feel like? When in a trance you feel more mentally and physically relaxed. It is a very pleasant experience, and you can tell that you are still in control. You can still hear exactly what is going on around you, unless you choose to drift your attention away. You become aware that you can easily stand up, talk, or move whenever you want. A lot of people (me included) when they first experience a hypnotic trance move their fingers or hands in order to test whether they can move at will. Sometimes a patient can be a little difficult to wake up. This is not a sinister thing as it has been portrayed. No one has ever been stuck in trance. It is more a case that a patient just "can't be bothered" to wake up as it feels so pleasant. However they soon become bored and will wake up pretty soon. One trick the old hypnosis pro's use is to tell the patient that they are charging for the time. It's amazing how quickly they then wake up!

Is hypnosis dangerous? A hypnotic trance is actually a very natural state that almost everyone goes into several times per day. In 1955 the British Medical Association set up an inquiry which favourably reported hypnosis as a therapeutic tool. It even recommended that it should be taught at medical schools. Hypnosis was also approved by the Council of Mental Health of the American Medical Association in September of 1958 as a safe practice with no harmful side effects. Since then there has been acceleration in the establishment of hypnosis societies for doctors, dentists, and psychologists. No one has been seriously hurt with hypnosis.

Can I be made to do things against my will? You could never be made to do anything against your will or contrary to your value system. If this was actually possible, would there not be criminals learning the art of hypnotherapy in order to hypnotise their bank managers to opening the vaults and handing over a large sum of cash?! In a trance, you would not unknowingly reveal your deepest secrets. You can even lie when in a trance, which is one reason why testimony in hypnosis is not permissible evidence in a court of law. It is only used by police to help with the investigation. A person will only act upon suggestions that serve them in some way or reinforce an expected behaviour, anything else their subconscious will just ignore. Most people develop these misperceptions from seeing or hearing about a Stage Hypnosis show. However they largely achieve their results from showmanship, selection of the more extrovert people, and peer pressure.

How long will it take before I notice a change? In one session, you can expect to become more relaxed than you are right now. Most people do not relax enough, and some people never seem to relax! Being more relaxed can help most mental and physical problems that you may have. I have often had patients report back to me that people noticed that they seemed more relaxed after just one session. In the past I have significantly helped problems such as IBS, skin complaints, and addictions, simply by doing relaxation work. Hypnosis can bridge the gap between your head and your heart, making your goals much more emotionally compelling, and therefore increasing your chances of permanent change. Depending upon the intensity of your session and the number of times you have listened to the recording, you will notice suggestions for the desired behavioural changes spontaneously popping into your conscious mind almost immediately.

hypnosis
hypnosis quit smoking