I’ve done many tests on around 10-15 different options and while there are many out there, it’s been really hard to find a solution that meets 100% of our needs.

Here are some of my requirements:

• High level of security – I want to make sure that we can offer a safe environment for young people and our staff. So, we require a high level of security which gives me the ability to control who enters our group, record our sessions and also be able to export out chat history.
• Features – We require some basic features such as Chat, keynote share, video share etc and some other advanced features such as a multiuser whiteboard, file sharing and maybe some other add ons to really help us deliver out content.
• Branding - While adding our own logo to the meeting room is important branding goes a lot deeper than just adding a logo. We want to make the room look really attractive to young people to help keep them focused while they are in the meeting room.
• Good connection- We’ve all had bad experiences with Skype or iChat video and sound dropping in and out while we’re trying to talk to our loved ones. We know that this will probably happen a little but we want to make sure that we get the best connection thats available to us.

Adobe Connect

On my first day on the job I spent a lot of my time googling and trying to find some unknown meeting solutions and I stumbled upon Adobe Connect. After arranging a demo and completing a trail I was really impressed with the product so when it came to finalizing a couple different solutions it was top of my list. Connect has the majority of features we require but the real negative seems to be that if we want to have a multi user whiteboard then we have to give each user the presenter right which isn’t good enough.

While adobe connect would be a great starting point for our online groups, I sometime question the level of customer support that adobe can offer us. I brought a month license of adobe connect from their website and it looked and worked ok until I realized I didn’t have all the features I expected it to have. After 3 days (it really was nearly 3 days) on the phone to adobe they still couldn’t deal with my issue. If they had a better standard of customer service it would be a no brainer.

Click Meeting

I stumbled upon Click meeting pretty late and my initially I was very excited to finally find a product that was marked up at a reasonable price, had all the features we needed but was also very easy to use.

My first test with click meeting went really well and I became really excited but that excitement didn’t last too long. What I’ve found through test all these different options is that while it works really well with just one or two people it really struggles when there’s more than 3 people. In fact Click meeting was the worst software once we had 5 people using it at one time. There was a huge delays which really slowed things down.

Digital Samba

One of the first options we looked at was Digital Samba. We were really excited about this product but we later found out that it really lacked a handful of basic features which we required. After a few months I noticed that there had been an update so I decided to give it another go and I was pleasantly surprised when the features I desired had been added. After testing for a while we decided to move forward with Digital Samba.

Have you ever used any of the above softwares? What do you think are some key important aspects for taking youth work online?

I recently started a degree with OU and one of the modules suggested that I read at his article about how we manage our reputation online. Please feel free to read and leave any suggestions below.

Are you happy with the results people get back when they Google your name? If not, there are easy ways to monitor and guide what information is published about you online. Two years ago we covered how to have a say in what Google says about you, and more recently, and how to track down anyone online. But a rash of social media sites have arisen that give you more tools to help you manage your online reputation and become more findable. Let’s take a look.

Why Reputation Management’s Important
Anyone can create a web page that describes you inaccurately or criticizes your performance at a company. Web sites have emerged to trash bad dates and insult company representatives—and those pages are not what you want potential dates or employers to find when they Google you. If making a good name for yourself online is a priority, it’s time to take a proactive approach to getting your name out there the way you want.

How to Monitor Your Online Reputation
One of the easiest tools for tracking what Google knows about a topic is Google Alerts. Subscribe to a Google Alert and receive an email as soon as your search phrase (like your name or company) enters Google’s index. Google Alerts cover news stories, video comments, blogs, pages found in web search, and even Google’s own mailing lists, Google Groups. Be forewarned: popular search terms will yield a lot of messages! Narrow your results down or opt to receive a daily or weekly digest (versus as-it-happens alerts).

Blog search engine Technorati tracks buzz in the blogosphere, by indexing the body of blog posts as they are published. You can subscribe to Technorati searches for your name or product in your feed reader. If you’re looking to monitor blog comments, check out previously mentioned co.mments which keeps you informed of the ongoing discussion. For all things “web 1.0,” Board Tracker watches conversations in discussion forums and keeps you up to speed.

If you don’t want to track each location manually, previously mentioned MonitorThis aggregates data from 22 different sources, including many of the aforementioned sites. MonitorThis will give you an OPML file you can import into your feedreader.

Control the Message
Once you start monitoring what people are saying about you or your product, you may find inaccuracies or incomplete statements. There are a few ways you can amend and respond to them.

Your own blog is the most effective method for getting your message seen and heard. Here are some free tools for setting up your own blog. Once your blog is up and running, address the points you found on other blogs and maintain pages that get your name and message up on top of the search results. Tip: Google loves fresh content. The more you update your blog, the better. As long as you keep the search phrases you want Google to find in the forefront, you’ll likely find yourself closer to the top of the search results.

Social media sites offer countless ways to participate in online community, and most of these profiles offer the added bonus of search engine visibility. Flickr, YouTube, Digg, Wikipedia, Facebook, and Twitter are six mainstream social media sites that feature results when you perform a web search. They are also high-authority sites that are favored by search engines. Use each one appropriately and make sure to emphasize correct key phrases (such as your name or your company name). If you can interlink these social media profiles with your blog posts with acceptable anchor text, you can help push up other positive pages in the search results.

Here are some tips on how to get the most search juice from these profiles:

Flickr (photo sharing): Use your name in the title and description of the image. In Flickr, you can also add links to comments and HTML. Also, take advantage of tags!

YouTube (video sharing): The title of your video can help a lot. Popular videos are often ranked high in search results.

Digg (social news): Digg and other social news sites allow you to customize your profile with your personal information and affiliated websites. There is also room for a short bio where you can emphasize key words.

Wikipedia (collaborative encyclopedia): Wikipedia is a bit of a tricky one because you’re not allowed to edit your own page or your company’s page as per their guidelines. However, you can contribute to Wikipedia and use the Talk: page to engage in a discussion.

Facebook (community): In order to display your profile in the Google results, you will need to change your privacy settings.

Twitter (micro-blogging): Claim your username on Twitter (before someone else does) and fill out the short bio.

You can do all of the above as an individual, but the web is about interconnectedness, so the next step is to get involved in the community. Network with others in your field of interest. If you’re passionate about science and love to write, contact a science blogger and ask to post a guest post on their blog. Put your social media site membership to good use and participate in the community and in forums. If you don’t like what others are saying about your company, be receptive to criticism—and address it.

One of the most important things you can do to control the message is to go to the source and communicate directly with the publisher. However, that option isn’t always available. Sometimes you’ll just have to deal with Internet meanies and grow that thick skin. When direct methods fail, take the opportunity to be proactive and to create web pages and social media profiles search engines will find and use to push negative inaccuracies further down in the results.

Got your own effective methods to manage your reputation online? I’d love to hear them in the comments.

Many young people in 2012 won’t know what myspace is but it’s safe to say that if there wasn’t myspace we wouldn’t have Facebook, Google+ etc. Myspace launched in August 2003 and changed the way we use the internet forever.

April 2008 saw Facebook overtake Myspace in the number of unique world wide visitors which quickly resulted in a drop in Myspace’s clout. Recently Myspace has been taken over by Specific Media LLC and pop star Justin Timberlake.

Over the last few weeks Myspace has come out and announced “the new Myspace”. They are still in the developing stages, but from the video and blogs on the web I have to say i’m excited about a possible return for Myspace.

Do you think it could work and make a big come back?

I hear it all the time from people. “I’m passionate about it.” “I’m not going to quit, It’s my passion”. Or I hear it as advice to students and others “Follow your passion”.

What a bunch of BS.  ”Follow Your Passion” is easily the worst advice you could ever give or get.

Why ? Because everyone is passionate about something. Usually more than 1 thing.  We are born with it. There are always going to be things we love to do. That we dream about doing. That we really really want to do with our lives. Those passions aren’t worth a nickel.

Think about all the things you have been passionate about in your life. Think about all those passions that you considered making a career out of or building a company around.  How many were/are there ? Why did you bounce from one to another ?  Why were you not able to make a career or business out of any of those passions ? Or if you have been able to have some success, what was the key to the success.? Was it the passion or the effort you put in to your job or company ?

If you really want to know where you destiny lies, look at where you apply your time.

Time is the most valuable asset you don’t own. You may or may not realize it yet, but how you use or don’t use your time is going to be the best indication of where your future is going to take you .

Let me make this as clear as possible

1. When you work hard at something you become good at it.

2. When you become good at doing something, you will enjoy it more.

3. When you enjoy doing something, there is a very good chance you will become passionate or more passionate about it

4. When you are good at something, passionate and work even harder to excel and be the best at it, good things happen.

Don’t follow your passions, follow your effort. It will lead you to your passions and to success, however you define it.

Like I was saying, you can’t help but hear about Bieber in the news at the moment and all these rumors that he got some girl pregnant. Now I want to make it clear, I am in no way going to say if i think it’s true or not and to be honest i’d rather focus on something which i know will be refreshing for a lot of you younger folk out there but hearing these kind of stories from “Christian Celeb” is becoming more common.

I remember a time when I told certain members of my friends that I wouldn’t have sex until I was married and I remember their response really clearly “that’s weird” and ever since then they’ve called me “Virgin Child” even after 8 months of marriage. I’ve really been thinking about what it means to be a Christian and after a few months of thinking about it, i’ve finally come to a conclusion.

We’re called to be weird

Now, before you all go off and wear some really bad christian t-shirts (not including the XXXChurch in that statement) and decide never to wash, let me explain that statement.

Everywhere we look around us we see our people getting drunk, consuming drugs, sleeping around, getting in debt and divorcing so much so that all those things are becoming the normal. Most of us are entertaining some of those things above or know of someone who is. This is classed normal. So if all those things are classed as normal surely it means that the people who don’t do those are obviously classed as ‘Weird’.

I think we are all called to be weird. I think weird is good. Whenever we look in the bible there are many stories that we could call weird, but it those weird stories that’s changed us. We look at the parting of the seas, a virgin women giving birth to a baby and ultimately Jesus dyeing on the cross. We can look at those stories and think “wow those are some weird and confusing stories” but it’s those stories that’ll change our lives and the lives of other if we allow them to.

So if what we read about Justin Bieber, Britney spears and even our friends is the normal I DON’T WANT IT!!! My dream is to see a generation of young people to grow up weird, that wouldn’t flow the flock and would be a real testimony of what it means to be a christian in todays world.

This time of the year nearly every Church in the world will be covering the story of Jesus and him dying on the cross for us. For us Christians this story is the foundation of our faith.

I couldn’t think of any greater act of love.

So when I hear stories about Christians who go out and do some unspeakable things in the name of God, where are they getting this from?

Recently heard about some Christians who would burn people who don’t agree with their views and beliefs and then recently I heard about a couple of pastors who burnt the Koran and a Church in America who are telling people they are going to hell. These are just a couple of ideas of the stuff that is going on today and if we look back in history we see a countless amount of dictators and people who believe they are on a message from God to wipe our a whole generation of “unclean people”.

Hang on…. JESUS DIED ON THE CROSS

Like I mentioned above Jesus dying on the cross is the most earthshaking thing that could happen. When Jesus died on the cross it means all we have to do is repent and say I messed up and let him into your life.

I know for me when I first became a Christian I was always judging people and thinking things like “oh, he’s a Christian and doing this” or “why’s he getting all the good stuff when I’m the one who’s being a real Christian”. Now it’s very easy to pick up that mentality many people who live by this kinda mentality are normally people who have a me focus rather than a Jesus focus.

This year just like every year I sat down and watched the passion of the Christ and every time I Jesus was being whipped and beaten I just heard Jesus whisper to me “I went through this for you”. Jesus Hanging on the cross is the biggest act of love that I could ever imagine.

So why do so many ‘Christians’ get it wrong and do some stupid things in the name of God? I’m going to start a series which is called in the name of Love. In this series we am to challenge you to do things in the name of Love because it’s then people will really meet God.

To all my nonbelieving, sort-of-believing, and used-to-be-believing friends: I feel like I should begin with a confession. I am sorry that so often the biggest obstacle to God has been Christians. Christians who have had so much to say with our mouths and so little to show with our lives. I am sorry that so often we have forgotten the Christ of our Christianity.

Forgive us. Forgive us for the embarrassing things we have done in the name of God.

The other night I headed into downtown Philly for a stroll with some friends from out of town. We walked down to Penn’s Landing along the river, where there are street performers, artists, musicians. We passed a great magician who did some pretty sweet tricks like pour change out of his iPhone, and then there was a preacher. He wasn’t quite as captivating as the magician. He stood on a box, yelling into a microphone, and beside him was a coffin with a fake dead body inside. He talked about how we are all going to die and go to hell if we don’t know Jesus.

Some folks snickered. Some told him to shut the hell up. A couple of teenagers tried to steal the dead body in the coffin. All I could do was think to myself, I want to jump up on a box beside him and yell at the top of my lungs, “God is not a monster.” Maybe next time I will.

The more I have read the Bible and studied the life of Jesus, the more I have become convinced that Christianity spreads best not through force but through fascination. But over the past few decades our Christianity, at least here in the United States, has become less and less fascinating. We have given the atheists less and less to disbelieve. And the sort of Christianity many of us have seen on TV and heard on the radio looks less and less like Jesus.

At one point Gandhi was asked if he was a Christian, and he said, essentially, “I sure love Jesus, but the Christians seem so unlike their Christ.” A recent study showed that the top three perceptions of Christians in the U. S. among young non-Christians are that Christians are 1) antigay, 2) judgmental, and 3) hypocritical. So what we have here is a bit of an image crisis, and much of that reputation is well deserved. That’s the ugly stuff. And that’s why I begin by saying that I’m sorry.

Now for the good news.

I want to invite you to consider that maybe the televangelists and street preachers are wrong — and that God really is love. Maybe the fruits of the Spirit really are beautiful things like peace, patience, kindness, joy, love, goodness, and not the ugly things that have come to characterize religion, or politics, for that matter. (If there is anything I have learned from liberals and conservatives, it’s that you can have great answers and still be mean… and that just as important as being right is being nice.)

The Bible that I read says that God did not send Jesus to condemn the world but to save it… it was because “God so loved the world.” That is the God I know, and I long for others to know. I did not choose to devote my life to Jesus because I was scared to death of hell or because I wanted crowns in heaven… but because he is good. For those of you who are on a sincere spiritual journey, I hope that you do not reject Christ because of Christians. We have always been a messed-up bunch, and somehow God has survived the embarrassing things we do in His name. At the core of our “Gospel” is the message that Jesus came “not [for] the healthy… but the sick.” And if you choose Jesus, may it not be simply because of a fear of hell or hope for mansions in heaven.

Don’t get me wrong, I still believe in the afterlife, but too often all the church has done is promise the world that there is life after death and use it as a ticket to ignore the hells around us. I am convinced that the Christian Gospel has as much to do with this life as the next, and that the message of that Gospel is not just about going up when we die but about bringing God’s Kingdom down. It was Jesus who taught us to pray that God’s will be done “on earth as it is in heaven.” On earth.

One of Jesus’ most scandalous stories is the story of the Good Samaritan. As sentimental as we may have made it, the original story was about a man who gets beat up and left on the side of the road. A priest passes by. A Levite, the quintessential religious guy, also passes by on the other side (perhaps late for a meeting at church). And then comes the Samaritan… you can almost imagine a snicker in the Jewish crowd. Jews did not talk to Samaritans, or even walk through Samaria. But the Samaritan stops and takes care of the guy in the ditch and is lifted up as the hero of the story. I’m sure some of the listeners were ticked. According to the religious elite, Samaritans did not keep the right rules, and they did not have sound doctrine… but Jesus shows that true faith has to work itself out in a way that is Good News to the most bruised and broken person lying in the ditch.

It is so simple, but the pious forget this lesson constantly. God may indeed be evident in a priest, but God is just as likely to be at work through a Samaritan or a prostitute. In fact the Scripture is brimful of God using folks like a lying prostitute named Rahab, an adulterous king named David… at one point God even speaks to a guy named Balaam through his donkey. Some say God spoke to Balaam through his ass and has been speaking through asses ever since. So if God should choose to use us, then we should be grateful but not think too highly of ourselves. And if upon meeting someone we think God could never use, we should think again.

After all, Jesus says to the religious elite who looked down on everybody else: “The tax collectors and prostitutes are entering the Kingdom ahead of you.” And we wonder what got him killed?

I have a friend in the UK who talks about “dirty theology” — that we have a God who is always using dirt to bring life and healing and redemption, a God who shows up in the most unlikely and scandalous ways. After all, the whole story begins with God reaching down from heaven, picking up some dirt, and breathing life into it. At one point, Jesus takes some mud, spits in it, and wipes it on a blind man’s eyes to heal him. (The priests and producers of anointing oil were not happy that day.)

In fact, the entire story of Jesus is about a God who did not just want to stay “out there” but who moves into the neighborhood, a neighborhood where folks said, “Nothing good could come.” It is this Jesus who was accused of being a glutton and drunkard and rabble-rouser for hanging out with all of society’s rejects, and who died on the imperial cross of Rome reserved for bandits and failed messiahs. This is why the triumph over the cross was a triumph over everything ugly we do to ourselves and to others. It is the final promise that love wins.

It is this Jesus who was born in a stank manger in the middle of a genocide. That is the God that we are just as likely to find in the streets as in the sanctuary, who can redeem revolutionaries and tax collectors, the oppressed and the oppressors… a God who is saving some of us from the ghettos of poverty, and some of us from the ghettos of wealth.

In closing, to those who have closed the door on religion — I was recently asked by a non-Christian friend if I thought he was going to hell. I said, “I hope not. It will be hard to enjoy heaven without you.” If those of us who believe in God do not believe God’s grace is big enough to save the whole world… well, we should at least pray that it is.

Your brother,

Shane

Read more: www.esquire.com

The first person who’s really been helping me out is John Saddington from Tentblogger.com. This site really is the go to place when you need any advice with writing your blogs, launching a new site, fine tuning your focus for your site, coding or anything you could think of. This site has helped me highlight some areas of my site which i needed to change and as I write I’m a couple hits away from doubling my current record of monthly hits to my blog and I’ve already doubled my subscriptions via RSS feeds and emails. The reason for this is the advice I got in terms of direction of my posts and being consistent with my posts. Before I stumbled across tentblogger.com I would post maybe 3 blogs in a day and nothing else for a week or two. As a result of reading a few blogs from tent blogger I decided to aim for 3-4 blogs a week with them all being on different days. This has really helped with bring more people to the site and it seems easier to create new material.

The other person who’s been a huge help to me in my blog mentor Matt Snider from geekforhim.com. He’s been very helpful in directing my time. Where there’s been times I thought it would be a good idea to do a redesign or change certain things, he’s really helped to keep me focused on my writing and things thats going to make the most difference right now, which has just been posting regularly. You should head over to his blog as he has some very interesting posts too.

So no matter if your a newbie to blogging or a seasoned professional I recommend you head over to tentblogger and geekforhim and see what cool advice you can collect for your blogs and start creating some great material.

Also Jon Jolly should get a mention as he’s helped me out over the years with my writing and recently with the technical side of running my site.

I’ve had many people ask my why I’m so passionate about the work of XXXChurch and let me try and sum it up really Quickly.

I am really passionate about this ministry because its a ministry that is letting the message of Jesus’s love change them and effect their lives and then they share that message of Love. I’ve witnessed to many Christians who say they know God loves them and then do nothing about it but this is so not the case for XXXChurch.

My first introduction of XXXChurch was when I heard about the free accountability software that they offer and really since downloading the software the relationship has grown to the extent that I’m off to help them on an outreach at a porn show in Miami and then on to Las Vagas to receive a bunch of training which will help me towards my goal of helping people with addictions for porn and surrounding issues and also the people within the industry.

As always some of you are reading this blog might’ve never heard about XXXChurch and there may be some of you who are reading this who have your own feelings about XXXChurch. No matter what your feelings are about XXXChurch I would challenge you to watch the video that is in the blog because that will really highlight the work they do with the people in the industry.

Like I said I will be flying out to Miami in just under a month. This will be an amazing experience, one that I’m sure will change my life. The video that you’ll find on this blog really challenged me when I watched it over a year back and since then there’s been a clip in that video that has always stayed with me and its a comment from Steve-O which goes like this…. “they say you need to come in here with an open mind, but I think you really need to come in here with an open heart”. I totally understand what he’s saying because we are all called to love (yes, that does mean the guy in the video with the signs) and Steve has lived that. I spoke with Steve earlier today and he said he’s planning to go to the show in Miami but he’s needing some help for the finances. I would love to get a bunch of people who read this blog to throw $10 or what ever you feel you can give to the direction of XXXChurch to help with his costs. If you would like to read more about him and his passion you should click on some of the links for his site’s and social network pages.

Anyway please do feel free to leave comments with questions or even stories of how porn has effected your life. How ever, I do ask that in the next few weeks to come you would be praying for me and the other people on the team that we can be one huge expression of God’s love.

Give funds to help Steve-O

Steve-O’s Facebook

I find it so difficult to sit down and just read my bible and take it in. Its the same with a lot of books that I read which has really upset many times because I like to read. The thing I love about Glo from the very short time I’ve had my hands on is the media that has been made available which has already helped me take a lot more of the material I’m reading and apply it to my life. Granted I currently only have the lite version (which is free) which means there will be more made available to me once I’ve got the full version but for now if your not sure about it check it out it’s free after all.

This is software is free for the basic version but you do lose a lot and I believe at the moment its only $69 if you brought it online. I’ve just been using the Lite version but if you feel you would like to bite the bullet and go for the premium I don’t think you would be disappointed.

Go a head a check it out for yourself. Glo Bible Software

Let me know what you all think