The recent rash of negative news ranging from multiple exchanges shutting off new-users and subscribers to the overall crypto market shedding 150 Billion in market capitalization over the past week.

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They would attempt to liberate themselves from the distractions and responsibilities of modern-day life in order to cram eight hours of study time and I was observing some of the world’s most capable language learners at work.

The friends set themselves the challenge of learning a language in a week in order to stretch themselves, and then it was a question of choosing which language to learn. English presented itself as a natural option; there are nigh on 300,000 English speakers in Germany’s capital, and the areas are dotted with stores adorned with signs in English.

“Truly understanding one’s environment requires one to first understand English”

The first operational step in the friends learning process was to decorate the entire apartment with sticky notes. This had an almost ceremonial touch to it as the friends delved into dictionaries and proceeded to label everything with its corresponding English name.

Within the space of about an hour it was impossible to carry out any menial task, be it making a coffee or flicking off a light switch, without first being presented with at least three different words related to this action.

The importance of the other twin’s presence became immediately apparent as Katy and Sara delegated responsibilities for rooms to decorate with sticky notes. This simple task was augmented by continuous little tests that they would spring on one another, and the fact that they split up their day slightly differently and studied different topics meant that each twin became a source of knowledge for the other.

The most extraordinary moment came towards the end of the week!

The friends simply switched their everyday conversations to English, asking one another if they wanted tea or coffee, were ready to cook dinner or when they were going to leave the house.

Katy and Sara had numerous micro-challenges throughout the week. On the first day they were visited by a English friend who greeted them in English and complimented them on how quickly they’d picked up their first words and phrases.

They then learned the names of fruits and the numbers from one to a billion so that they could visit the English market (although they refrained from purchasing nine hundred thousand kumquats). Displaying their haul after their first functional exchange in English, they beamed with pride and a palpable sense of accomplishment before marching back home to study further.

On our second visit to the brother’s apartment 24 hours into the week, we found them sampling dozens of different kinds of English snacks.

Like kids staring at the backs of cereal packs before heading to school, the nutritional information and various special offers and competitions on the packaging were analysed during snack breaks.

There was no moment of complete removal from the language learning process during the eight hours that the friends had allotted to it.

They were constantly using their existing knowledge to support the ever-growing knowledge of English, this being the root of their success.

“you will likely come across words that share common origins with your native tongue”

The friends spent a lot of time engrossed in books or on their computers and apps, flicking and swiping their way through exercises eagerly, but at other times they were to be found searching busily for English radio stations and write-ups of English football games on the web.

There is no definitive method to learn a language fluently

All too often, people enter their weekly language class to converse with their teacher, but then barely have any contact with other speakers and that’s not enough.

The old saying that we can solve problems more effectively when we sleep on it may be especially true if the problem we’re trying to solve is learning a new language.

Researchers from two Swiss universities wanted to know if they could enhance the learning of words from a foreign language by exposing people to the words during non-rapid eye movement sleep the deep, dreamless sleep period that most of us experience during the first few hours of the night.

To find out, they gathered two groups of study participants, all of whom were native German speakers, and gave them a series of Dutch-to-German word pairs to learn at 10 pm. One group was then instructed to get some sleep, while the other group was kept awake.For the next few hours both groups listened to an audio playback of the word pairs they’d already been exposed to and some they hadn’t yet heard.

The researchers then re-gathered both groups at 2 am and gave them a test of the Dutch words to uncover any differences in learning. And indeed there was a difference:

“The group that listened to the words during sleep did better at recalling the words they’d heard”

The simple yet potent trick the researchers employed is known as verbal cueing, and this isn’t the first claim made for its success while sleeping. But what makes this study different is that it puts a finer point on the conditions necessary for this trick to actually work namely, it only works when we’ve already been exposed to the verbal cues before we sleep.

The researchers added a techie dimension by conducting electroencephalographic (EEG)recordings of the sleeping participants brains to track neural electrical activity during the learning period.

They found that learning the foreign words overlapped with the appearance of theta brain waves, an intriguing result since theta is the brain wave state often associated with heightened learning while awake (usually we’re in either the high-frequency, high-alertness alpha or beta states while awake, but it’s thought possible to induce theta state slower in frequency than alpha and beta through concentration techniques).

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The Virtuix Omni is purportedly the first virtual reality device/interface to allow a human to move naturally and freely without obstruction in your favorite game. This will also work with various VR headsets allowing the interface to be platform agnostic. Beside the obvious cool factor and utility of the product in the VR landscape the company is also seeking investment that equates to a mini-IPO taking advantage of the JOBS Act under Regulation A, which we’ve discussed before and I know this audience cares deeply about.  As of this article there is already $31 million dollars of indicated interest. This comes on the heels of $6.8 million dollars of crowdfunding and angel investment that reportedly includes Mark Cuban. If you’re looking to invest you can do so here on Virtuix website. The official offering will be through SeedInvest and the minimum investment will be $1000.00.

If you want to take a super cool look that goes beyond the Virtuix demo at CES 2016 check out this omni-treadmill footage of Skyrim to get a real taste of what this is like. Coming from someone who is eagerly awaiting his Oculus Rift to arrive I can tell you I’m drooling!

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The bad news is that affected my writing commitment as you noticed. However, the good news is after launching four more businesses and two more children (literally tiny humans) in a two year time frame I’m back. The musings of acquisition, operational delight and disposition of businesses & real estate for the average Joe continues.

The discussion finally continues to not settle for the status quo but rather transcend the mindset of  “trading hours for dollars”. We instead will focus on leveraging a passive income source for ourselves as soon as possible. Can’t wait to share the good, bad and ugly of two new business verticals including restaurants and manufacturing. Looking forward to your comments as always.

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What if you could predict which conversations online are going to become important days before they do? Well, blabpredicts.com is a service meant for just that.

The service allows you to discover which topics and conversations, even surrounding your brand, are gaining momentum online, allowing you to track which ones are worth paying attention to.

To me, the concept makes perfect sense. Freelance bloggers such as myself pride ourselves in talking about content before everyone else is, and the staggering potential for businesses is pretty obvious.

From crisis communication to brand management, or even community building, Blab boasts an opportunistic approach for brand managers who want to target audiences where they are ending up online.

Is it gimmicky or the real deal? Unfortunately, I haven’t had the opportunity to demo the product myself, but Blab has been pretty straightforward with explaining how the site uses large amounts of data it collects from you in order to chart accurate results.

Basically, you’re hiring Blab to do the research and management that you don’t have the time or the ability to do. It’s a great concept that has yet to be fully explored in such a concise package.

Expect blabpredicts.com to be making waves in the social media monitoring world soon.

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Though the streaming radio startup has been around since 2009, it has recently managed to reach international fame and status through high crowdfunding achievements (up to $9 million), so this is definitely a tech idea worth reviewing.

I was actually introduced to Jelli through my employer, who is a veteran with radio broadcasting but not too impressed with streaming stations like Pandora and Spotify. In fact, our office is pretty obsessed with determining which streaming radio service is best, with me advocating for Slacker, others for Spotify, and there is this one guy who actually likes Rdio (I’m kidding, it’s a great service if it could only work on my phone).

So, researching and identifying the value of Jelli has been a high priority for me.

The basics: Jelli differs from any other streaming radio service I know of. Rather than dictate song choices through a DJ or randomized computer, users vote for which songs they want to play next. It’s almost like the turntable app on Facebook  You can have favorite stations, each with a community more in tune with your tastes. You can then have input in your music experience by voting for which songs appear on the playlist.

You can use Jelli on iPhone, Android, and on your desktop for free at any time. What’s really unique is that many live fm radio stations actually use Jelli’s programming for their music.

The general idea is to combine the benefits of FM radio with streaming radio (and even some elements of satellite radio). You have the accessibility and vast array of options that streaming radio has, but with more specific choices you can get from satellite. Combined with the community-oriented approach of live radio, we have something completely new.

Jelli is growing fast and is well-loved by its base, earning a solid 5 stars on the Android market at the time of this article. One of the main reasons for this is because the site is well-monetized through advertising and programming fees radio stations must pay, without cluttering the actual user experience.

Do I prefer Jelli? I’m someone that loves having music on-demand. I use my iPod nano for most of my musical choices. When it comes to streaming, I have not yet converted fully from Slacker to Jelli, though I’ve only used the latter for about a month. The main reason is because with Slacker Premium, I can listen to full albums on-demand, which is not in Jelli’s nature. Jelli, however, is the best music discovery app I’ve come across.

This is because these stations are perfectly filtered. Only the best songs make the cut, and there are features such as “rocketing a track” that encourage and incentivize voting for new, unfamiliar songs. Yes, I have come across stations that only have hits on them, but there are far more stations that are niche and play songs I’ve never heard of that are very good.

What if a bad song creaks to the top? Users can actually vote if a song “rocks” or “sucks” while it’s playing. If it’s voted “sucks” enough times, it will be pulled off the air immediately, even on fm radio. I find that fantastic, though it doesn’t seem to happen much.

Due to its current momentum, I predict that Jelli will become more recognized in the coming months, if only because it’s unique service seems to really resonate with people. Time will tell if it becomes a household name for me as well.

Don’t forget to check out THE JON REPORT every day, updated at 8am for a list of today’s main headlines as selected by my editorial team (me) 

The post Is Jelli the Next Big Thing For Social Radio? appeared first on Startup Addict.

All new UK businesses need to register with Companies House, a register of companies that operates under the remit of the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills . While  US companies are incorporated at the state level, in the UK they are incorporated at national level. Businesses based in England and Wales must register to the office in Cardiff, while those in Northern Ireland use the Belfast address and those in Scotland register with the Edinburgh office.

When registering, you will need to choose a structure for your business. The four most common are public limited companies (PLCs), sole proprietorship,  partnerships and limited liability companies. There are also other structures available such as co-operatives and franchises. Most of these operate in the UK in the same way as they do in the USA. However, it’s important to note that PLCs are subject to a higher degree of scrutiny and are more complex to set up and administrate than other types of company. Just like in the USA, where there are services such as BizFilings and LegalZoom to guide entrepreneurs through the formation process, the UK has services like The Formations Company that do the same thing – these may be particularly useful if you are not familiar with UK company law.

You will need to complete an annual return every year and submit it to Companies House – these can be filed online for a charge of £15, or in paper form for £30. Your accountant will also need to send your annual accounts, also known as a financial statement, to HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC). Again, just like in the USA, tax authorities in the UK are very stringent – it’s vital to ensure everything’s in order or you may receive unwelcome attention from HMRC.

There are other regulatory considerations to make – for instance, if your company’s product is taxable by Value Added Tax (VAT), you may also need to register additional forms with HMRC, and you will need to apply Pay As You Earn tax and national insurance to your employees’ salaries. Once you have taken care of these, you’ll find running a business in the UK very similar to your experiences in the USA . As always consulting a native experienced attorney is recommended, we wish you the best of luck in you UK ventures!

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Many new businesses are choosing to operate virtual offices instead of carrying out day-to-day business in the traditional office environment. Commuting costs, travel expenses and the desire to have flexible work schedules are all contributing factors to the rise in virtual offices. A virtual office has many advantages, but there are weaknesses to consider for individual business needs. Read on to find out what we consider to be the pros and cons of running your own virtual office.

Pros:

Save money on rent, utility bills and commuting. You will still need a PO Box to direct any mail to, but this address now does not need to accommodate all of your staff, which means space and rent is no longer an issue and you can increase the size of your workforce without the financial worry.

Your staff members are likely to be much happier knowing they can have the flexibility of working from home and without the stress of the daily commute. Happier staff means better productivity.

Be more environmentally friendly, as less paper waste is created along with the fact that the environment is not being damaged by transportation to the office.

Services like Skype and Google Hangouts now allow us to hold video conferences over the internet, and smart phones mean employees can be reachable anytime anywhere via email, text or a phone call.

”I’m snowed in”, “My car won’t start”, “The bus didn’t turn on”… how many times have heard this? With your team working from home, you won’t have to deal with these problems.

Cons:

–    Technology allows us to run a virtual office, it is not fail-safe. What happens if one of the key members of your team are unable to work due to their laptop breaking? Their internet connection going down? Ensure you have enough IT technicians on staff to be able to travel to each staff member who is experiencing technical problems.

–    How do you know your staff are really working at home? Make sure you employ people you can trust, and be prepared to establish a time tracking methods through cloud based software.

–    Lack of direct interaction can mean that certain tasks cannot be carried out in a virtual office. What about team projects? Documents that need signing off by more than one person?

–    Some industries are less suited to virtual offices than others. Think about whether you need your team all in one place in order to carry out simple day-to-day tasks

So, in conclusion, virtual offices definitely can work, just be prepared to spend some time weighing the advantages and disadvantages It all boils down to your business type an cost-benefit analysis.

* Guest Post *

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The startup Yapp, is offering its users the ability to create their own personal apps that they can share with friends. It is not a service designed for more interactive apps. For the purposes of this review, I will highlight both the potential and the limitations of Yapp.

I experimented with the beta version of Yapp several months ago and walked away from it unimpressed, mostly because the official service had not yet launched, so I did not see the value in creating something that would not be seen. Well, that all changed when Yapp announced their official launch the other day, so I though it fitting to delve into the service once again and develop a full critique.

It is essential to mention that Yapp is targeted at event-planners, especially weddings. You have several tools at your disposal to cultivate an event invitation. Some cool features include the ability to integrate a Twitter newsfeed into your app, which would allow planners to have streaming info that would stem from either a Twitter profile or a selected hashtag. This is one of the highlights of the experience, leaving room for even more social integration that would make this worth your while.

Because I’m not getting married anytime soon (and I have no events worth making an app for), I decided to use Yapp as a business development tool, making my own business card accessible as an app. Why do this? Well, Yapp gives you your own QR Code that allows you to share your app. It is also advantageous because Yapp allows you to send the link via email or SMS, so all you need is a fellow colleague’s contact info to send your own along. I can definitely see this being handy at conferences when I routinely run out of business cards.

The only limitation with this feature is that you don’t necessarily have your own app. Your app is only accessible through the YappBox app, which the link prompts you to download. The problem here is that you have another barrier to cross before finally getting someone to your app, a hurdle that can potentially halt a connection with the person you want to view your app. 

Another limitation in general is the current inability to really customize your content. To date, you can really only add photos and text along with your Twitter feed. You can’t customize the layout, making your design selection slave to the handful of default skins presented to you. My hope is that this builds in time, which would lend the kind of high-quality content that your app would need to have to maintain real stickiness with browsers.

For my business card, I added contact information, a brief synopsis, and my personal logo. In the end, it looked pretty and can serve the purpose of making me looking trendy (if that really is a good thing). After reading some reviews online about the app’s versatility as an invitation tool, I think it’s safe to say that the app-building service does this well and is worth checking out if you want to get a little creative with invitations. Other than that, I can only recommend this as a fun experiment that may surprise you, but I don’t see much value using this as something effective to market.

Oh, and I would be remiss to not include the link to see my new app! You can scan the QR code or simply follow this link on your mobile phone: http://my.yapp.us/Z4ZKFG

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“Social News” is definitely a marketing term that carries little meaning. After all, don’t we already have a huge influx of news being pushed through our various social networks?

Well, here’s a somewhat novel idea: social news that only covers people you follow. With Newsle, you can import your friends from Facebook and LinkedIn (Sorry Twitter!) and track when they have been mentioned in the news.

You can also track when your own name has come up in the news. It took about 30 minutes for my social networks to import, and when they did, I was I able to see various news stories about my friends and contacts. It was exciting to read about previously unknown accomplishments my friends have made and was more useful than a simple Facebook status.

This literal “newsfeed” definitely has a fresh interface with sticky content. On my own stream, I was able to read an article featuring one of my public relations mentors in American Thinker, a Facebook friend who had just been mentioned on NBC for his latest college football accomplishment, and a post about one of my former professors getting her class to design iPhone cases as a project, which was featured on Tech News.

I was pleasantly surprised by the quality of content the site was able to generate, and it is certainly impressive that founders Axel Hansen and Jonah Varon were able to execute such a precise algorithm for finding the right friends for each article.

The site is pretty easy to navigate, with the main Newsle header following you as you click on news links. This header gives you the option to share the article via Facebook or Twitter, but the LinkedIn plugin is noticeably absent. You can also declare an article to be “Awesome,” a feature akin to a Facebook “like.”

As usual, I will also voice my various concerns with the platform. Many have pointed out that this concept has been tried before through Angstro, which failed to gain any traction and was eventually bought by Google in 2010. While I personally believe it mostly had to do with the less-than-stellar brand name, it is reasonable to point out that finding your friends in the news can be difficult for some people who may not have many prominent friends or contacts.

Newsle attempts to get around this obstacle by encouraging you to follow public figures and celebrities that you can see articles about, almost like a hybrid of LinkedIn and Twitter. While I’m not personally sold on the concept, I can see this being enticing for teenagers and superfans. Still, the design and feel of the site lends more to professionals and LinkedIn aficionados, rather than pop culture targets.

One of my biggest questions is what we can really use the site for. Some may see it as a way to track people in the news that they are just researching that would be more effective than Google Alerts. From what I can see, this would come in handy for a variety of reasons, but I’m not sure many people will take the time to try it out for themselves and experiment.

There are plenty of features I didn’t even get to that I highly encourage you to discover for yourself (I am still finding new things to do), and be sure to voice your own opinion in the comments. I leave you with this question: Does Newsle have what it takes to build a large, loyal network?

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