Now most technology experts are expecting almost similar kind of impact from Artificial Intelligence – better known as ‘AI.’ Currently, the hype around AI is so huge that every day millions of startups are founded with the promise to build effective AI tools and software applications. These AI enabled applications that are being painstakingly designed are expected to change the way we humans live our lives.

Now the question is if AI is expected to have such a profound impact on human life, then why would something as important as ‘branding’ would remain immune from its impact. The answer is it ‘cannot.’ In fact, AI has already started making waves in the branding world and this impact can be felt most in the area of logo designing – the most critical area of branding. Now, this is certainly likely to raise many eyebrows as many people still believe that AI cannot automate creative work. But the truth is AI has the potential to churn out good and flawless creative work just as we humans can.

AI Designers and Logos

Today many AI designers and AI-enabled designing tools are revolutionizing the way several creative agencies are making their logos. Simply put, today advertising agencies have been spared from straining their brains as all the tough creative tasks are easily handled by AI designing software. Most designing software effortlessly pulls precise information from the available complex data and then combines them with industry specific characteristics. While designing software carries out this complex process with a lot of precision, the end result (i.e. logo) is just as accurate.

This is to say that AI designed logos are found to be more impressive and hence have a high chance of resonating with the target audience. This efficiency is due to the fact that most designing software is fully capable of understanding the latest trends in logo designing and can also flawlessly implement them in the designing process. And this is just some of the benefits of logo designing software when compared with usual alternatives.

While the efficiency of AI designer software is praiseworthy, their user-friendly interface deserves an equal amount of praise. Today many logo designing softwares offer options that enable users to easily choose the font style, logo type, writing styles, color etc. This obviously has over-simplified the logo designing process.

AI Designers Are Set to Improve Further.

One may very well argue that AI designers with all its abilities to create perfect logo are still in its nascent stage. But there is no doubt that this gap will be closed earlier than expected.

For instance, we will soon have AI designers that can precisely gauge complicated human emotions – as precisely as advertising professionals can. This revolutionary development will certainly enable logo designing software to create logos that can easily connect with their target audience. Furthermore, a lot of effort is being made to develop more intelligent AI chatbot to facilitate discussions with clients. If successful, this will greatly reduce creative agencies’ dependence on client servicing professionals.  This certainly appears to be in the realm of possibility, given that Siri, Cortana and Google Assistant have already set an impressive benchmark on this front.

AI Designers Will Truly Democratize Branding

AI designers will equally have a phenomenal impact on the economics of branding. This is to say that it will drastically bring down the cost of logo designing. A situation that will augur well for small agencies and freelancers. For decades small agencies and freelancers were forced to stretch their shoestring budgets in a bid to hire a good logo designer. Something that left them quite financially vulnerable, while big agencies had no problem in hiring one.

But AI designers with its affordable costing are all set to change this unfair game for once and all. The end of this unfair game will bring much needed level playing field and customers/clients are also bound to benefit from this fair game.

Conclusion

Most industry experts have already given a foregone conclusion that AI designers will have an unprecedented impact on online branding. More than anything else, it will make branding more accessible. Accessible not only in economic terms alone but also in over-simplification of the branding process. Simply put, AI designers will help in saving a lot of time, money, human efforts and add a lot of efficiency in logo designing. We most certainly will have to brace for a new chapter in the world of branding – all thanks to AI designers.

This article presents a collection of websites that offer distinct, well-developed resources to increase your productivity.

Part I: Research & Homework Tools

In elementary school, you carried a plastic box containing all of the essential supplies you’d need from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m., every day. In college, however, you’ll need more than a sparkly pencil with a chewed-up eraser to make it through a macroeconomics class or a research paper. Below you’ll find a few examples of high quality, free resources that will help you study more efficiently.

Ice Cream Apps

Ice Cream Apps offers free programs that perform basic functions you may require intermittently, but not often enough to justify the purchase of a dedicated product. Programs offered include a PDF converter, audio/video media converter, ebook reader, PDF split and merge tool, screen recorder, image resizer and a slideshow maker.

Paste Bin

Paste Bin is exactly what it sounds like: an online text box where you can paste things to free up your clipboard. By signing up for a free account, you can also save or publish your pasted content. Most major platforms are supported—you can paste something into your Windows phone and open it on your Mac, for example.

OverDrive

Think of OverDrive as a worldwide public library for ebooks, audiobooks and videos. Boasting a collection of over two million titles shared by thousands of libraries in over 40 countries, OverDrive likely includes resources not offered at your college or hometown library. To use it, you will need a library card or log-in information from a participating library. To find the nearest participating branch, use the search function on the OverDrive website.

iRuler

Need to measure something? Just use that pink plastic ruler that came with your Hello Kitty back-to-school set. Or, just use iRuler on your smartphone, tablet or laptop. The iRuler app displays an accurate ruler on the screen of your phone that you can use to measure things in centimeters or inches.

Coursera

Coursera offers nearly a thousand free courses through partnerships with the world’s top universities and organizations. Courses can be taken at any time, on any schedule and (optionally) for a Verified Certificate.

HippoCampus

HippoCampus provides resources and supplements for most subjects at middle school, high school and college levels. Through partnerships with Khan Academy, NASA and a number of colleges and public school districts, HippoCampus is able to offer video and text materials that can stand alone or act as enhanced study aids for difficult classes.

Part II: Information Retention

Need to memorize the first 600 digits of pi? Study for your American History final? Figure out the calculus homework from that class you slept through?

If so, check out these free tools designed to help you understand and retain course content.

FLVTO

FLVTO is a YouTube downloading service that allows you to turn your favorite videos into AAC, MP3, MP4, WMV, AVI and MOV files so you can access them offline whenever you want. If professors assign homework tied to YouTube content, you can use FLVTO to download the relevant videos. Or, you can use FLVTO to download TED Talks and mini-documentaries related to your coursework to bolster your understanding of the subject.

Quizlet

Quizlet is an all-purpose, digital flashcard system. You can upload your notes or enter terms and definitions directly into the set creator. Once you’ve made a set, you can share and combine your cards with classmates or search for other users’ sets; this is especially useful for common core courses and standardized tests such as CLEP exams and the SAT. Other functions include integrating images for easier memorization, creating customizable exams and designing single and multiplayer games using the flashcards. Best of all, Quizlet’s mobile app allows you to create and study flashcards on the go.

Pinfruit

Pinfruit has only one function: helping you memorize numbers using the Mnemonic Major System. Enter a number of any length and Pinfruit will give you a list of words to choose from. Each word has two major consonant sounds that correspond to two digits of the number you entered. These words turn even lengthy numbers into short, memorable phrases.

Wolfram Alpha

Wolfram Alpha is a computational engine that can do many impressive things (type in “planes overhead,” sometime), but its strength lies in calculation and computation. Using the site, you can solve language puzzles, get step-by-step solutions to nearly any mathematical problem, analyze statistics and perform measurement conversions. It can also supply interactive data about socioeconomic surveys, art, music, astronomy, digital objects, nutrition, organizations and transportation.

Part III: Group Study Tools

Whether you’ve been assigned a group project or just prefer to study with others, group study requires a different set of tools. The following sites can help you coordinate schedules and projects, collaborate without in-person meetings and communicate what needs to be done.

Slack

Slack is a centralized, multipurpose platform for teams. It functions as a searchable forum that can be accessed in an internet browser or through mobile apps, so that you can work (and find your work) anywhere, anytime. Slack integrates dozens of web services like Google Docs, Dropbox, Twitter and IFTTT, so that team members can contribute what they’ve developed in the programs they use individually.

OpenStudy

OpenStudy is a collection of over 1 million students throughout 160 countries collaborating in nearly 200 study groups to ask and answer homework questions. It’s also a great place to build companionship with those struggling or interested in similar subject areas. OpenStudy is free and allows you to sign in with Facebook.

Google Docs

Google Docs (together with Google Sheets and Google Slides) is a Microsoft Word (Excel and PowerPoint) like program that operates entirely within your browser. What makes Google Docs great for group work is that when you create a document and share its link, your group members can edit it in real time. Taking notes, developing study guides and building group presentations and papers are simply a matter of each person adding their content on their own time.

KanbanFlow

KanbanFlow is an advanced to-do list that can be used by an individual or a group. A KanbanFlow is a list that has multiple columns (often labeled “to do,” “in progress,” and “done”) with tasks on them that can be color-coded, assigned to individual users or broken down into subtasks. As users work on tasks, they can move them from one column to another, thus giving everyone in the group a complete picture of how projects are progressing.

Doodle

Doodle is a scheduling tool that links to Google, Outlook or iCalendar to suggest ideal meeting times. The group leader can suggest several meeting times and group members can respond with whether the proposed time is ideal, works or doesn’t work for them.

Google Hangouts

If you need to talk face-to-face but just can’t get together, Google Hangouts offers free video, audio and text chat tools that allow you to communicate and share content in real time.

Part IV: Organization and Environment Tools

A major part of being productive is simply knowing what you need to do, when you can do it and how to get it done. To finish up this series, here are a few tools to perfect your study environment and organization skills.

MyStudyLife

MyStudyLife is a web app that allows you to manage your class schedule, reach out to your classmates and take notes. If you’re looking for a straightforward, central place to put your schoolwork, give MyStudyLife a try.

Wunderlist

Wunderlist is a list-lover’s dream. Use your browser, a smartphone app or the downloadable program to create and manage lists. Wunderlist allows you to set deadlines, create sublists or notes within list items and star important items. You can also email tasks to your lists and share lists with others.

Google Calendar

If you’re still using a paper planner (or no calendar at all), it might be time to enter the digital age. Google Calendar is a free online calendar tool that has all of the bells and whistles of modern digital scheduling tools, including color-coded, recurring and shared events. You can also set Google Calendar to send you text reminders of upcoming events. Best of all, it can be integrated into any calendar platform, from Outlook to Cozi to your smartphone of choice.

SimplyNoise

SimplyNoise is the ultimate generic background noise generator. Choose from white noise (all frequencies), pink noise (a blend of high and low frequencies) and brown noise (low frequencies). Adjust the volume and turn on oscillation or the sleep timer (if you so desire) and you’re good to go.

Rainy Mood

If you’d rather listen to something more natural, consider Rainy Mood. Rainy Mood has no settings; just click on the link and get to work!

For free and no obligation consultation on web design, web development or graphic design, feel free to contact us

The above article has been originally published in a series of articles by HackCollege and can be seen here.

A good PowerPoint presentation has a lot to do with what you see on that deck, and how it was put together. These keyboard shortcuts will make it all easier.

Of all the programs in the Microsoft Office, PowerPoint is easily the one that requires the most artful usage. Novelists might use Microsoft Word, but you’d never be able to tell that based on what you read on the page.

The difference between a good presentation and a bad one, however, has a lot to do with what you see on that PowerPoint deck, and how it was put together.

We can’t help you find that perfect cartoon or meme to kick off your talk, but we can help you work more efficiently and easily within PowerPoint. Take a look at these 15 helpful keyboard shortcuts to gain more control over PowerPoint—and how polished your presentation looks for next week’s budget meeting. These shortcuts will work with PowerPoint 2013 and 2016.

1. Keyboard access to the ribbon: Just like Excel and Word, one of the key shortcuts to know is how to activate Key Tips. Pressing Alt labels each menu item with a letter, allowing you to navigate the program from your keyboard.
2. F6: Move clockwise between panes in Normal view.
3. F4: Repeat the last action.
4. Shift + F6: Move counterclockwise between panes.
5. Alt + Shift + Left Arrow: Move one paragraph up.
6. Alt + Shift + Right Arrow: Move one paragraph down.
7. Alt + Shift + Down Arrow: Move selected paragraphs up.
8. Alt + Shift + Down Arrow: Move selected paragraphs down
9. Ctrl + Shift + >: Increase the font size.
10. Ctrl + Shift + <: Decrease the font size.
11. CTRL + M: Add a new slide.
12. Alt + Shift + F9: Show/Hide the ruler
13. Shift + F3: Cycle the case for the selected text.
14. Ctrl + Home: Jump to the beginning of the first word in a text container
15. Ctrl + End: Jump to the end of the last word in a text container
16. Alt + Right Arrow: Rotate selected slide object by 15 degrees clockwise (Using this shortcut with the left arrow does the reverse).

Check out previous list of keyboard shortcuts for Excel and Word for more Office tips.

For professional and affordable Website Design and Development, feel free to contact us at Farend, for no obligation consultation.

The above article has been originally published by PC World and can be seen here.

Your Mac gets a bit slow and creaky as it gets older, and we can probably all identify with that. Unlike with our stupid, weak-willed bodies, though, we don’t have to accept our Macs’ slowing down and eventual obsolescence as a crashing inevitability.

There is a lot you can do to breathe new life into your aging computer to extend its useful life, and though some cost money—albeit vastly less money than it would take to buy a new Mac—many are free.

This isn’t about those wacky, cutesy projects to turn your iMac G3 into a fish tank or a Cube into a tissue dispenser, and nor is it about celebrating the zen of using an old, slow Mac that’s cut off from the Internet as a distraction-free writing tool, though there’s nothing wrong with any of that. What follows is tried-and-tested pragmatic advice to keep your Mac happily and gainfully employed for many years to come.

Understand Activity Monitor

Like a doctor, you need to understand why your Mac is sluggish before blundering in with treatments. So your first diagnostic step is to launch Activity Monitor (/Applications/Utilities) and see where the pinch points are. This will show you what applications are demanding the most from your main processor (CPU); click the %CPU column header to sort by this, and ensure you’ve selected All Processes from the View menu. If you don’t recognize a process, Google it; it might be a background app that’s run rogue.

Activity Monitor will also show you pressure on your memory (RAM). If you’re trying to run many, complex apps at once, your Mac might struggle. Start using your Mac as you would typically, and if the Memory Pressure graph on recent OSs isn’t looking full, you don’t need more RAM; on earlier systems, if the pie chart of RAM use shows mostly green and blue, the amount of RAM you have is “cool”; if it’s mostly red and yellow, you’re in hot water, and need to add more. Again, you can sort the RAM chart by Memory to see what apps are demanding RAM; consider quitting RAM-hogs if you’re not actively using them. (And don’t ever bother with “RAM cleaning” or flushing apps; OS X takes care of that for you.)

A little housekeeping

In the early days of OS X, we regularly repaired permissions and ran apps such as Cocktail or OnyX to clear caches and more to keep the system trim and tidy. These days there’s less need for that, but there’s usually no harm.

One good idea is to run Verify Disk in Disk Utilities (/Applications/Utilities) on your main startup disk every now and then to identify problems, and watch the SMART status for your boot drive in Disk Utility too; it’s monitoring for signs of imminent failure. Oh, and never be tempted to install MacKeeper.

Do a clean install

Usually, a Mac that has slowed further and further down has just accreted apps, files and more, and one of the surest ways of restoring the pep and vigor it had out of the box is to wipe the hard disk, install a fresh OS, and then, crucially, don’t clone everything across using Time Machine or the like. Instead, manually copy all your documents across and reinstall your apps from the App Store or CD—omitting those you don’t need.

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Yes, it’s usually a colossal pain, but it’s often the most effective way to reinvigorate your Mac if you can set aside the time and accept the temporary disruption.

Swap your hard disk for an SSD

Be sure you get the right form factor. For laptops and the Mac mini, this typically means a 2.5-inch drive—though the MacBook Air has always used more exotic and different options throughout its life—while for desktops 3.5-inch drives are more usual; this isn’t a hard-and-fast rule, though, so do check your specs carefully. 3.5-inch SSDs are rare, though they do exist, but you can convert 2.5-inch drives to 3.5-inch ones with a bracket; one might even be included with your 2.5-inch SSD, but if not, buy one separately. Other World Computing even makes one specially for the 2009–2012 Mac Pro.

Check you get one with the correct connector, too. Most often these days that will mean a SATA connector, but you can buy SSDs with the older IDE/PATA/ATA connector from, say, OWC; MacBook Airs use different connectors again. Note that with older Macs (definitely true for those with IDE, but also true for those with SATA I and SATA II connections), the connection to the motherboard itself will be a bottleneck, so don’t waste your money by buying anything other than a basic SSD; you don’t get the benefit of a high-performance model. Check your specs!

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Any SSD, however, will have a completely revolutionary effect on a Mac that’s only ever known a hard disk; it will feel much more responsive, and even if you have a small amount of RAM—because of how low-RAM machines swap information out to the storage drive when there’s too much for the RAM to hold, and since SSDs are much faster especially at this kind of data transfer than a hard disk—swapping to an SSD will also help even if you don’t touch the RAM.

You can just clone your old hard disk to the SSD and things will still improve, but if you can bear the hassle of combining it with a clean install, you’ll get such a fast machine you won’t recognize it.

SSDs will also likely extend the battery life of a laptop.

Add more storage—and offload files

Computers perform badly when their main storage drive is full—an oft-cited rule is to leave at least 10 percent of your drive free—so consider adding more storage and offloading files you don’t need all the time to it. This might be external storage—just plug in a USB or FireWire hard disk—but don’t forget about internal options. You can replace the optical drive in some laptops and Mac minis with a second internal drive, or use something like a Nifty MiniDrive to add more flash storage to a laptop.

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Many tower Macs will support at least one additional internal drive, and in this case (or also if you install a second internal drive in a laptop at the expense of your optical drive), consider using a fast SSD as your boot drive and pairing it with a high capacity, cheap hard disk. You can even link them exactly like aFusion Drive if you’re prepared to get your hands a little dirty in Terminal.

It might not be clear what files are taking up space on your hard disk, but apps such as DaisyDisk can help you identify them, and you can then either trash them or move them to an external drive. On very tight systems, runningMonolingual can save you a decent chunk.

If you want to uninstall apps, check (including with a web search) to see if it has a proper uninstaller first. Don’t fall for “to uninstall an app on a Mac, you just have to drag it to the Trash”; search for the app’s name to find support files and caches lurking in ~/Library/Application Support and elsewhere, or—with caution!—use an app such as AppCleaner.

Upgrade your RAM

It’s hard to give absolute guidance—it depends on what you do with your Mac; check Activity Monitor as described above—but a decent rule of thumb is that 8GB RAM is pretty comfortable for most people (especially if you have an SSD), 4GB should be seen as a bare minimum, and anything under 4GB should definitely be upgraded if possible.

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About This Mac will tell you how much RAM you have, and then it’s easiest to check a memory configurator at, say, crucial.com to ensure you get the right thing. Fitting RAM is one of the easiest jobs you can do so unless you’re reallynervous, avoid paying someone to do it for you.

Add as much RAM as you can afford, basically; with the kind of older systems we’re talking about, in any case adding the maximum possible is unlikely to hit your wallet hard.

Replace the battery in a laptop

If your MacBook, PowerBook, or iBook is only lasting minutes away from the mains, you can replace the battery. Apple no longer makes them for older machines, but there are plenty of third-party options available. It’s your call but we’d be uncomfortable trusting a no-brand bargain from eBay; buy with a guarantee from a reputable dealer.

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You might think you can’t replace the battery if it’s sealed in your MacBook, but not so. Some third-party options exist, but we’d recommend having Apple do it; follow the links on Apple’s site for costs and next steps; prices range from $129 to $199, plus taxes.

Boost the I/O

Use the fastest ports your old Mac has to connect peripherals—from slowest to fastest, it goes USB 1.1, FireWire 400, USB 2.0, FireWire 800, USB 3, Thunderbolt—but if the ports your Mac has are too slow for you, you might be able to add faster ones. You can add PCI cards for faster USB and FireWire (or even eSATA or fibre) to most tower desktop Macs, and this is also true for MacBook Pros with ExpressCard/34 slots; Sonnet makes a wide range. Check compatibility carefully, though.

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You can also add faster Wi-Fi to many Macs, either with a USB or PCI adapter or by connecting an external box to an ethernet port. (Just make sure the ethernet port isn’t so old and slow it will be a bottleneck.) And remember that, say, adding 802.11ac to your Mac is pointless if you’re still running an 802.11g router; replace that too.

Add a second—or third!—display

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Lots of us find ourselves more productive when we have more screen space. If your Mac can’t extend its desktop to a second screen for whatever reason, or if you’ve already added one external display but want to add more, remember that (somewhat expensive) adaptors exist to let you connect displays to USB ports. Make sure the one you pick is Mac-compatible.

Upgrade the built-in webcam—or add one

Even Apple’s latest webcams are pretty awful, which is especially irritating when adding a superb external one from the likes of Logitech is a pretty cheap investment.

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Tip: If a webcam lists compatibility with Windows Vista (yes, Vista) it will work with a Mac even for as far back as the old iChat AV app, since support for Vista presupposes support for UVC; in this case, you don’t explicitly need to see Mac compatibility listed.

Install the latest OS

As soon as we suggest upgrading to the latest OS your Mac will support, we’re inviting horror stories of old Macs completely grinding to a halt under the strain, and there’s definitely a danger with older Macs that newer OSs will demand too much. But as well as the security and features benefits of the latest OS, in recent iterations not only have Apple’s system requirements stayed broadly the same, but technologies such as App Nap and compressed memory in OS X 10.10 Yosemite can actually improve performance on weaker hardware.

If you’re worried, back up your system and verify the backup, then try the latest OS your hardware supports to see if there are any problems—especially compatibility problems with software you rely on—before committing; you can always restore back from your backup.

Add newer OS features to older OSs

If you don’t want to go the whole hog and update your entire OS, you can get some of the features of modern versions of OS X by adding third-party software, such as AirParrot, Continuity Activation Tool, TotalFinder, Alfred, Growl andFiledrop. It’s even possible—if sometimes a bit hairy—to install OSs on Macs Apple doesn’t officially support.

Install a modern browser

Much of our lives these days are lived online, and if you’re stuck with an old version of Safari or even Internet Explorer then you’ll run into frequent compatibility problems. Happily, TenFourFox is a modern fork of Firefox created for G3, G4 and G5 Macs. And if you’re rocking an even older system, check outClassilla for Mac OS 9 (and even 8.6).

Use an old Mac as a server

If after all that you still think your old Mac is just too slow for day to day use, it can still lead a useful life as a server. Simply checking a box in System Preferences lets it share files—consider attaching a huge external hard disk—and if you store your iTunes Library on it you can stream that to any Mac, iOS device or Apple TV just by enabling sharing.

You could go one better and install OS X Server—a separate version of the OS prior to 10.7, but a downloadable app from the App Store in 10.7 onwards—which gives you useful options such as the ability to cache software updates locally so you’re not hammering your bandwidth, and acting as a networked Time Machine target, like a Time Capsule.

Control a Mac remotely

No room? Tuck the old Mac server away in a closet and just control it remotely; no monitor, keyboard or mouse required. Enable Screen Sharing in its System Preferences, and connect to it from the sidebar of another Mac on your local network. Or if it’s recent enough, enable Back to My Mac so you can access it even when you’re not on the same network.

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You can go one better and buy Apple Remote Desktop, which gives you extra administrative and management tools.

Alternatively, connect it to the keyboard, mouse and monitor you use with your regular Mac using a KVM so you can easily toggle between them.

Install Linux

Even the suggestion is heresy, we know, but one of the problems with using an old operating system these days is that if you’re connected to the Internet—and who isn’t?—you’re more vulnerable to attacks. And since it’s often impossible to update an old Mac to a new version of the Mac OS, you could look to the Linux community. Not only will you get a more secure computer, but you’ll get access to lots of modern features, too.

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Now clearly it’s quite a big step, and it often needs even just a little bit more tech savvy to get started than many Mac users might be comfortable with, but especially if you stick to popular, user-friendly versions (“distros”) of Linux such as Ubuntu, it’s definitely much less of a geekfest than most probably assume.We’ve happily had Ubuntu running on a Blue & White G3 with aftermarket Broadcom-based Bluetooth and Wi-Fi added without having to muck about with drivers.

Follow all this advice and there’s no reason why you shouldn’t eke out another three, four, five years or even more out of your Mac’s useful life; if only extending our own lives were as easy! Share your own tips and stories of long-lived Macs in the comments below.

For professional and affordable Website Design and Development, feel free to contact us at Farend, for no obligation consultation.

The above article has been originally published by Mac World and can be seen here.

That means that over $40 billion in sales is going to outside merchants.

Amazon may be the largest Internet retailer in North America, but it’s the merchants who are pocketing the most money. That’s not the only surprise you may learn about the ecommerce behemoth. As marketing manager of AMZ Tracker, I’ve spent countless hours helping Amazon sellers grow their product sales, and I’ve come across all sorts of misconceptions.

So, if you’re interested in getting your own chunk of the Amazon pie, here are five myths about Amazon illustrating that it may not be exactly what you thought:

1. That Amazon is ‘just another website’

Amazon is the king of ecommerce websites. Social-media butterflies use Facebook to engage with friends. Internet users search Google for answers to questions. Online shoppers go to Amazon to do one thing: buy.

Given that $100 billion in expected annual sales, Amazon is the king of online markets. It has built-in trust, its buyers’ payment information is already saved and Prime members receive two-day shipping on all Prime-eligible orders. So Amazon can’t be beat when it comes to choosing an ecommerce platform to sell on.

If you’re serious about succeeding in ecommerce, chances are you stand to gain by selling on Amazon.

2. That selling on Amazon has to be difficult

You may think it’s difficult to switch from fulfilling your own orders to selling on Amazon, but for many merchants, the site actually makes their lives easier. Amazon has streamlined the fulfillment process through its Fulfillment by Amazon program.

For a small fee, Amazon will handle the majority of fulfillment and customer support tasks, which means zero phone calls, no shipping problems and less hassle for you, the merchant. All you have to do is ship your product, and Amazon wll take care of the rest.

3. That you can’t be successful selling on Amazon today

At our company, we see success stories every month from new sellers; these include multiple success stories of sellers going from zero to five figures a month in just a few weeks’ time.

If you think you’ve missed the boat on selling on Amazon, you’re wrong. The boat is still very much in the harbor, and there’s still time for you to get on board.

4. That Amazon is too crowded a market to enter now

It can seem daunting to enter the Amazon world when there are over two million sellers on Amazon, but consider the fact that there are over a billion items sold worldwide by these sellers. There are over 200 million products on Amazon in the United States. The site has 175 million monthly visitors.

So, there’s room for everyone to carve out a niche for themselves.

On Cyber Monday alone, Amazon shipped 16 million items from third-party sellers, which was a 50 percent growth rate year-over-year from the year before.

Amazon isn’t showing signs of slowing down, so it’s safe to assume that these numbers are only going to grow for next year’s online version of Black Friday.

5. That you can just ‘list your product’ and it will be successful

It takes effort to achieve success with a new product on the Amazon platform. If you think you’re going to list your product, write a generic description, and watch the sales roll in, you may be in for a rude awakening.

While it’s not too late to get in on the Amazon game, that doesn’t mean you can skimp on the marketing and optimization.

Listing-optimization is crucial to ranking high in the Amazon search engine. That’s the reason AMZ Tracker is growing like crazy — because sellers know that growing their sales ranking pays healthy dividends, and that software can help them do just that.

The time to get in on the Amazon gold rush is now, and if Amazon’s current trajectory keeps up, the next couple of years are going to be good years for third-party merchants.

For professional and affordable Website Design and Development, feel free to contact us at Farend, for no obligation consultation.

The above article has been originally published by Entrepreneur and can be seen here.

News articles, blog posts, update notices, sports stories, product and software reviews, etc. are all delivered via RSS. That’s just a few examples of the vast buffet of RSS content available today. RSS can deliver webpages, audio and video. Most RSS content can be accessed anonymously by any interested person (a few sites require passwords).

As our lives increasingly go digital, security is a major concern not only for the various online services we use, but also for the devices on which we save our data. Chances are that if you’re reading this article, you own a Mac. And on your Mac, you’d like much of the work you do on it to be kept private.

While OS X is relatively secure by default, there are some additional steps you can take to ensure the data on your Mac is only accessible by you, even if your Mac is stolen. Take the following tips to heart to better protect your Mac and its data.

Enable the OS X firewall

The firewall in OS X is a network filter that allows you to control which programs and services can accept incoming connections. While classic firewalls do this on a per-port basis—regardless of which software is using the port—OS X’s firewall can work on a per-application or per-service basis, giving you more flexibility.

To set up your firewall, go to the Security & Privacy system preferences, click on the Firewall tab, and then unlock the preference pane, after which you will be able to click the Turn On Firewall button. This basic option is the best for most purposes, but you can also click the Firewall Options button to see the specific settings for each application as well as access some additional features such as stealth mode (which hides your computer from outside access attempts) and an option for blocking all connections.

The firewall is a good option to enable if you’re connected to a public Wi-Fi network, such as one at a cafe, library, or other hotspot. For home networks you can usually rely on your router’s firewall for protection, though enabling the OS X firewall for added security generally won’t cause additional problems.

Enable FileVault

FileVault is the full-disk encryption routine in OS X that will secure all files on the drive, including OS X system files, applications, caches and other temporary files; any of which may contain personal or sensitive information.

To enable FileVault, go to the FileVault tab of the Security & Privacy system preference, unlock the preference, and click Turn On FileVault. When you do this you’ll be asked to choose the user accounts that are authorized to unlock the disk (you can add other accounts later, if you like). Click Continue and your Mac will begin encrypting your drive. This may take a while to do, especially with large mechanical drives, where both encrypting and optimizing may take a number of hours to complete. For a walkthrough on setting up FileVault, see this story.

Full disk encryption is primarily useful for protecting a stolen Mac. When your drive is unlocked, files on it can be read. However, before it’s unlocked (ie, your Mac is shut down), all data on the drive will be scrambled. This prevents data recovery by unauthorized third parties, who might try to access it using Target Disk mode on your Mac or by removing your Mac’s hard drive and attaching it to another computer.

Password management

If you use numerous online services regularly then you will (or should) have different credentials for each one. These may be difficult to remember. Often people store their credentials in a text, Word, or Pages file for easy access, but this is a highly insecure way to store passwords. In OS X you have a built-in alternative for managing passwords called the keychain.

Unlike other security options, the keychain is enabled by default to store your various passwords for online services, email accounts, sharing services, and many other authentication routines. Whenever you see a checkbox for saving your password, or in a drop-down menu when using Safari, this is OS X asking you to store these passwords in an encrypted file called the login keychain.

This keychain can be managed using the Keychain Access utility (/Applications/Utilities). In most cases, unless you’re troubleshooting your Mac, there’s little need to use this utility. Instead, simply use the option to save your passwords and OS X will automatically enter them where appropriate.

There are some third-party password tools such as 1Password that provide expanded password management. If Keychain Access and Safari’s ability to store passwords don’t provide you with the features you need, try 1Password or a similar utility.

Locking and locating

A final couple of options for protecting your Mac include securing your computer when you have to leave it unattended and enabling remote access to it—not only to interact with it from afar, but also to track and lock it down, if needed.

You set up the first of these options in the General tab of the Security & Privacy system preference. Just enable the Require Password option and chooseImmediately or 5 seconds from the pop-up menu and you’ll be required to enter a password to use your Mac after it’s gone to sleep or the screen saver has started. The shorter the time interval you use in this feature, the better, especially for laptops. Just close the lid to lock the system.

To remotely access and track your Mac, open the iCloud system preference and switch on the Back to My Mac and Find My Mac iCloud services. With the first option checked you can access the sharing services you’ve enabled on your Mac. For example, with Screen Sharing turned on, your remote Mac will appear in the Finder sidebar, where you can click it and share its screen to view and interact with your remote Mac’s desktop.

For Find My Mac, if your system is ever stolen you can log into iCloud.com or use the Find My iPhone app on an iOS device to locate your device, send it a command to lock it down unless a password is supplied, have it issue a sound (also a great option for locating a misplaced iOS device), or remotely wipe the device. See How to track a lost computer with Find My Mac for more details.

Overall, while Apple can do very little to prevent your computer from being stolen, OS X does its best to protect the data it holds as well as offers a chance that you can pinpoint its location. With these options enabled, you can be sure your Mac’s data is as safe as possible, with little to no inconvenience for you.

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The above article has been originally published by MacWorld and can be seen here.