A Blog About Accessibility, Digital, Marketing, and AI
People are always asking me if it is safe to use your credit card on the Internet. Finally a stat that shows where the REAL security threat resides:
The most common place for credit card information to be stolen is at a restaurant, according to Visa.
The credit card company, which constantly monitors cardholder transactions and data for fraud, has determined that 40 percent of all credit card theft occurs at dining locations — more than at any other type of merchant. source
A new pay-per-action model could help Google lead the way in addressing the industry's problem with click fraud.
Google is beta testing a different business formula for its AdSense product that eases up on its lucrative pay-per-click model in favor of a pay-per-action model. The new program could help address the click fraud problem that dogs the per-per-click sector of the online ad industry.
The idea with the beta test is to provide advertisers more latitude with ad contracts by stipulating payment only for pre-determined actions that result from a Google ad, such as a certain product purchase or signing up for a newsletter. source
Apparently, Gmail has a hidden shortkey key to delete messages -- the pound key.
Do you know that GMail has a simple keyboard shortcut to delete email messages ? The same key combination works across all web browsers but for some reason, Google decided not to share it with GMail users.
If you are reading a message in GMail, press the # key (Shift 3) and that message will instantly move to Trash. Source
How many parameters does Google consider in their algorithm? Used to be about 100 in the old days. Now it appears to be 250 parameters that factor into your page ranking:
Gupta chisels away at the PageRank algorithm simply by looking at what the No. 1 ranked sites are doing. "We have identified 250 parameters that Google studies to rank a site," he says. "We've got labs where people are constantly monitoring the impact of each. But the birds-eye view is, how can we make a site simply perform well in the natural course?" source
An email report from MediaPost states Google's Click Fraud represents only .02% of its total traffic. Source
For those of you building widgets or doing data transforms using XML, check out the new XML Aficionado blog. Written by Alexander Falk (CEO of Altova - the makers of XMLSpy), the XML blog posts news on interesting new technologies, trends, gadgets, and software development tools. Falk's passion about creating great developer tools exudes from his posts.
Read more at the XML Aficionado blog
I have been a long-time fan of the Cornell Notes method for taking notes. It was originally conceived for students, but I find it to be an invaluable note taking system for business. I take notes in the lined area, then go back and summarize action items on the left. I put a square box next to each action items which I can them use to check off items completed. For example:
[ ] Email Susan
[ ] File this
[ ] Call John re: this
I created these in Excel for maximum flexibility. The Letter (8.5x11" version) layout is a single Cornell page; the Classic (5.5x8.5" version) is in 2-Up format, meaning you print on letter, and use a paper cutter to trim to size. For the Classic version, the page on the left is Cornell format, and the page on the right is a Blank page format.
Download the Excel templates:
Here is another great resource on this topic from LifeHacker.
One of the big frustrations if you're a PC guru who is called upon to help diagnose PC problems remotely is not being able to see the desktop of the computer you're working on. I received two calls to help with MS Word issues just this weekend alone. RemotePC (http://www.remotepc.com) offers secure Remote Access to windows PCs from anywhere via any internet connection. It is easy to use, fast and less expensive that than solutions like gotomypc.com.
From your computer you can view the desktop of the RemotePC enabled computer and using the software's view the remote desktop, help diagnose software issues, and read emails and edit documents as though you are directly working on that remote computer.
Technology evolves quickly. Within six or nine months of a project delivery, the market may produce entirely new platforms radically altering your build-vs.-buy decisions. Delivering solutions in 30 to 90 day cycles enables regular reassessment of business assumptions.
Projects spanning nine months or more tend to be inflexible. Most project managers are not interested in reworking the base assumptions of an elaborately crafted massive project plan. By contrast, web solutions that are delivered in 30 to 90 day life cycles allow a business to quickly change course and take advantage of newly released technology solutions.
Remain competitive by delivering with web speed in an ever-changing market.
IBackup is an application that can perform interactive and scheduled backups of your critical files to an online backup account. I particularly like it in that it has Windows, Mac, and Linux versions, making it one of the few such solutions on the market. It has easy to use native graphical user interface which allows you to transfer your files. The interface supports drag and drop to retrieve or backup your files.
First time users can use an automatic selection, restore and scheduler wizard to easily manage their file backups.
There is an option to receive email notification for your scheduled backups.
Read more about IBackup - Online Backup and Storage