Are you ready for yet another new Facebook

Last night my parents called me to let me know that I should have been watching 60 minutes. It really made no sense to me. What would there be on 60 minutes that I, a tech savy entrepreneur would be interested in? Well I watched and before my very eyes was the king of Facebook himself Mark Zukerberg.

He was there revealing a brand new look and feel to Facebook which is scheduled to launch this morning. The interview is a two part series but what was more fascinating was the exclusive that they provided 60 minutes of being the first to review the site.

With the new interest in Facebook due to the movie Social Network, who could blame 60 minutes for jumping at the opportunity Want a sneak peek before the website launches? Check out this video provided by 60 minutes which really breaks it all down. http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504803_162-20024631-10391709.html

UPDATE:  If you want to update your profile go to this website http://www.facebook.com/about/profile/

I pray for you

I was just listening to the radio and came across this song. It started out like all the other songs out there you know country background talking about who knows what relationship issues or relations with religion. Anyway I was just about to turn off the song and then it took a turn. What was boring me all of a sudden became a truly humorous song. Now nobody ever wants anyone to have anything bad like this to ever happen to someone for real but the idea of praying for someone but for all the wrong reasons just really makes you sit there and enjoy what can only be a truly special song by Jaron and The Long Road to Love. Enjoy and let us know below what you pray for.

Free Games Site Gets Facelift

World of Free Games, home to a large variety of free games downloads since 2009, recently made several site improvements in preparation for the addition of over 100 new games.  The new games are slated to be added by the end of the year and will include puzzle, word, action games and more. The site upgrades are designed to improve the user experience, organize the current games, and enhance navigation throughout the site prior to the new content additions.

One of the new features on the site is the inclusion of detailed descriptions on each page.  Users benefit by being able to quickly get a snapshot of what each page is about.  New game descriptions, enlarged images, and the addition of even more images also help the user gain important information about the free games downloads and get a clear picture about the variety on the site.

Smiley Chomp

To enhance the user experience in finding the exact type of game they are looking for, improvements were also made to site navigation. Links throughout the site now make navigating from page to page easier.  Several other navigation options are currently in the testing phase as well. 

In a further effort to make the site easier to use and to make certain that users had a way to get answers and voice comments, a Help page was created and changes were made to the Contact Us page.  Furthermore, revisions were made to the About Us page to more adequately feature the security and privacy commitment of the site through the TRUSTe Certification program.

Perhaps one of the best new features of the site is the addition of a new page for Kids Games.  With so many cool games for kids currently on the site, this is a strategic move to make users aware of their existence and set the stage for the new games to come later this year.

Spongebob Squarepants Collapse

Take a minute to check out the enhancements to World of Free Games and keep your eyes open for all the new, free games to come. Plus, if you have any thoughts, suggestions, or great ideas, we would love to hear your feedback. Please leave comments on our site.

The Unbelievable Power of Social Media

It’s a big deal lately. It’s a really big deal. If you have not jumped onto the jet that is rocketing some businesses to uncharted success, you should consider getting on board. Make your own Facebook page and keep it updated. Build your social network on this site and on your own Twitter account. These two highly interactive sites are great places to begin if you need to make a social media start. There are more high profile sites out there, but these two have the greatest overall impact. If you’re still skeptical, perhaps these three success stories will inspire you to become part of the new social wave.

An unknown business in Utah has come from behind to arrive at more than a million dollars from sales inside of a year. Orabrush is the company, and if you have not heard of them, lots of others have, thanks to social networking. Their principal product was created to eliminate bad breath. It took the combination of an elderly inventor and a young college student to make this brand a success. The older gentleman came up with the product, and the BYU student orchestrated a catchy video, loaded it up on YouTube and marketed it using only Facebook and Twitter. And that’s it. This invention made a million with online sales in less than 12 months simply because 20 million people viewed the video on YouTube, 250,000 pushed the “like it” button on Facebook, and the orders began streaming in for the specialized toothbrush.

SteelMaster Buildings is not the first type of business you immediately think of in connection with social activity, but they have found – and filled – a slot on Facebook for prefab steel construction. They created a Facebook page for their company and started to test ideas they felt would help market their structures. Just what is it that makes Facebook work? It is the network you create and keep. Having satisfied customers submit pictures – and have the chance to win a cash prize – of the way they use these steel buildings was the idea that worked best. This company figured out how to match the need with success.

Combining Facebook and Twitter to get yourself known is a sure fire way to increase visibility to potential clients. An equine dentist – i.e. a dentist for horses – from Florida found this combination was the best way to lengthen his reach past his immediate locale. Geoff Tucker made his own Facebook page and began making connections and friends. He also created a personal Twitter account and began writing a personal blog. The mixture of these three ensured an online presence and allowed others to get to know him as the man behind the job title, not just as some equine dentist. This visibility online got him greater press on both TV and radio. He was thrilled to be featured on HorseGirl.tv and Horse Talk Radio. So the social sites led to other avenues of success. He is gratified by the 100 leads he has netted from his online accounts and with the 10-15 happy clients who have found him as the end result of networking.

Are you convinced? Jump on, because there is still room for your company to find success by making the most of social media. Try it – you’re bound to be pleased with the results.

How to Avoid Survey Sites That Scam You

If you’re out there in the Internet world, and you’re looking to make some cash, you’re going to find that there are many ways to make money.  You can make money by doing data entry work, secret shopping, and more.  I’ve been making some side cash online for quite some time now with paid surveys.  While there is some money to be paid, you will not become rich, trust me on this one!

Since I’ve been working with them for about four years now, I wanted to give you some pointers on how you can pick out scams, as well as avoid them.  You’re going to find that it isn’t as hard as you think!  As long as you use your head, you’re going to find that you can save yourself a lot of time, and effort.

#1 Do your homework: Let’s say that you find a company.  Instead of signing up right away, do a quick Google search on the company.  This will help you out a lot!  Sure, there’s going to be negativity for just about every company out there, but generally, you can get a good vibe on what’s bad, as well as what is good.

#2 Trust your gut: Look around the site, and see what it is all about.  You will want to get the following questions answered, when you plan on signing up.

• How are you going to get paid?  Is it via points, or cash?
• Can you do referrals?  If you can, this is where the money is at.
• How long have you been around?  When did you get established?

#3 Check with the BBB: The Better Business Bureau (BBB.org) is a great place to check for businesses reputations.  You will find that if you research a company, and they have a great grade, you should be rest assured that the company is going to be legit.

#4 Look for payment proof: When you join a research panel, you will want to be assured that you’re going to be paid.  Let’s say that you want to join a company called “XYZ Surveys.”  What you will want to do is go to Google Images, and look for payment proof.  If people post check images, etc, you can be assured that they probably pay.

Finding a scam isn’t that hard, and if you trust your gut and follow the four steps above, you’re going to find that you can find a lot of companies that will rip you off.  As long as you do your homework and search online, you’re going to find that you can make a decent amount of money on the side.

This guest post was written by Tom Tessin.  He runs FindMySurveys, a paid surveys directory helping people find legit survey sites.

There is always a time you see a video that makes you wonder….

There is always that moment that a video presents itself that puts you in a state of wonderment. This happened after seeing this video put out by tungle.me as they related the importance of various timing in ones day. As you watch this video it is chilling to think how much time is wasted and how much we leave aspirations behind due to the fact that we just don’t pursue our dreams. I want you to take a closer look at this video and send it off to others that you hope can gain the extraordinary meaning behind this well put together film.

Old Spice does it again!

Now seriously I never really pay that close attention to a commercial let alone about deodorant but the guy on the Old Spice commercial is truly mesmerizing. I just so happened to be surfing the internet when I came across this advertisement.

Anyway I ended up clicking on the link and was greatly surprised to see that they took the campaign to the next level actually answering all of the inquiries of everyone leaving comments. What a brilliant campaign to get everyone talking. At one point there was even back and forth banter with one @Alyssa_Milano who tweeted back and forth with the Old Spice guy.

Just take a look at the end of the interaction to get a better idea where this all went.

Finally the Old Spice guy left us with his final video where you get quite a surprise at the end of it all.

Old Spice, pat yourself on the back for an excellent campaign!

A boss in information security forgot to lock his computer..

I just have to say this post that is going around the internet be it real or not is a typical prank you can usually find around the office that hurts nobody and in this case even educates the user that they should be aware to lock the computer when leaving the desk. What are your favorite backgrounds to put on a co-workers computer? Post it in the comments.

It May Be Time For You To Re-think Free Internet Radio: Pandora vs. Jango

Until recently, I never really got into the whole free Internet radio fad. It seemed like everyone in the office was using some free Internet radio site, but I just never really looked into it—most of the time I was content to use iTunes shuffle.

Lately, however, I have been getting a little tired of what iTunes shuffle has to offer and have been looking for a simple solution to find new music while working, without having to put in too much effort.

Pandora was the first free Internet radio website suggested to me by a co-worker. I was using it for about five to ten minutes before I got annoyed and decided it wasn’t worth it.

Not only did it limit the amount of times I could skip through songs—only 12 songs a day across all of the stations for the free service—but there was also annoying advertisements. Now, obviously I know sites like Pandora have to pay for their service somehow, mostly through advertisements. It just seemed like the ads came up a bit too often for my liking, but perhaps that’s just me and I’m too impatient for many free Internet radio sites.

I liked the idea of Pandora, but wasn’t satisfied with what it offered enough to ignore what I didn’t like about it and continue using it. It limited the amount of times I could skip a song, there were lots of ads, and I could only listen to 40 hours of music a month.

While Pandora states that, “Most Pandora listeners never hit the 40-hour limit,” and that may be true, I am just not a big fan of limits being imposed on my music-listening time.

On top of this, I just didn’t like the set-up of Pandora. Again, being impatient, I was looking for a site that I could enter into my address bar and just start playing good music without having to figure out all the in’s and out’s of the site first. Perhaps I was asking for too much? I know many people who do like Pandora, but at first glance I was just not one of them.

And so, after trying Pandora for only a short time and almost instantly not liking it, I went back to my iTunes shuffle for the rest of the day.

I was beginning to think that perhaps free Internet radio and I would just not mesh well together. After all, I absolutely hate listening to most regular radio stations—they don’t play what I want to hear, there is too much talking/advertisements between songs, and if I have a particular artist stuck in my head, I’d like to listen to them without calling in a request.

And then…I found Jango.

Now, if you are a Pandora enthusiast, at least hear me out. For me, Jango proved to be the much better free Internet radio alternative to Pandora.

After the first five to ten minutes of using Jango, I thought to myself, “I love this. This is SO MUCH BETTER than Pandora.” And here is why.

Jango offers, in my opinion, a much easier set up than Pandora. Within the first few minutes of using the site, I had already heard music that was new to me that I instantly wanted to add to my iPod. I just typed in artists I liked, added them to my station, and off I went on my merry way listening to songs I liked and songs I was soon to like.

Not only did Jango quickly serve up songs that I was really enjoying, but it seemed that if I wasn’t enjoying one track, or if I wasn’t in the mood to hear a song, there was no limit to the amount of songs I could skip.

Now, I can’t tell you that I’ve personally sat at my desk hitting the skip button to see exactly how many times it would let me do so—let’s face it, that would be a huge waste of time. However, I have definitely hit the skip button more than 12 times in a day on Jango and I have not run into a problem with a limit to the amount of songs that I can skip yet.

As for the advertisements, yes Jango has them. But, they are far less often than on Pandora, and you can ‘x’ out of them when they come up. Also, the ads on Jango do not interfere with the music that you’re listening to at the time the ad pops up. It’s a crazy concept—but most people who are enjoying the song they are listening to do not want to suddenly be listening to an annoying advertisement. Weird, huh?

Jango also offers what appears to be a much more social experience. Not only can you add friends to your profile on Jango, but Jango tells you who is like-minded to you with very similar music taste. You can also see who is listening to your station and thank them for tuning in, or tune into another user’s station to see what others are listening to.

Jango gives a user the ability to send private messages to other users (like e-mails), or short private messages to users that will show up directly in the other user’s player (like DMs on Twitter), and public comments on other user’s profile pages.

To be fair, Pandora does allow users to connect to their Facebook accounts. On Pandora, you can see who on your Facebook friends list is on Pandora and what songs/artists they like.

In my opinion, the atmosphere on Jango still just seems more like a social networking experience than on Pandora. You can even tweet or send out a Facebook status of what you are listening to on Jango right now, which may get more of your followers or Facebook friends interested in using Jango.

While I appreciated the idea of Pandora, I appreciate Jango even more. To me, it seems like Jango took the idea of free Internet radio and improved over its competitors.

From now on, I won’t have to decide between Pandora or iTunes shuffle. I’ll be on Jango.

Video game novice

Guest post written by Debbie Piland

My grandson had begged me since Christmas to play this new video game I gave him as a present. I had never really played any games beside Tetris and other puzzle ones before, but I decided to give it a try one day a few weeks ago.

It was a car racing game, so I thought it may be easy to play because I’ve been driving a real car for decades. Well, the controls weren’t really anything alike, but I picked up on them after a little while and found that I really enjoyed playing the game!

As we played more, I kept turning the volume on the TV up louder because I couldn’t hear what the announcer for our race was saying. Eventually my daughter came in the room to fuss at my grandson for the TV being too loud but was surprised to find me in there too. She suggested that maybe I should get a hearing aide and coaxed me into scheduling a free hearing test.

I know that my grandson didn’t mind me turning up the TV loud, but that makes me wonder what other similar things I’ve done because of my hearing.