High Performance Productivity

How Macrosoft is Contributing To Smoogle’s Strategy For World Domination!

noreply@blogger.com (Chetan Pinto) — Mon, 06 May 2013 08:26:00 +0000

Disclaimer: All the characters and brands represented in this post are purely a work of fiction. Any similarities between the characters and brands represented here to those in the real world are purely co-incidental.

Macrosoft: We’ve got a new OS product, Dingdows 8. It’s really cool and has touch functionality even for your laptop.

Me: But I don’t need touch on my laptop. I’ve an Mandroid smartphone already which I like touching everywhere, everyday, thank you!

Macrosoft: Don’t worry, this works without touch as well. But the upgrade will set you back 200$

Me: But I’m really happy with my Dingdows SP.

Macrosoft: Isn’t that like really old now? That’s like sooo 2003! Dingdows 8 is way too cooler. Moreover we’ll stop supporting Dingdows SP from 2014 onwards.

Me: But I really love my SP system (although I could touch it too!). Why do I need to go for an upgrade that’s really bad and also pay for it? I don’t get it.

Enter Smoogle:

SMOOGLE: Hi, we’re the friendly neighbourhood guys. We’re at your service, FOR FREE.

Me: Macrosoft will stop support for SP in 2014 and the fear mongering has already begun.

SMOOGLE: What’s the fear exactly? Maybe we have a better solution.

Me: Once Macrosoft refuses to patch existing loopholes, the bad guys will take control of my PC through browsers and steal my money, personal details and do other horrible, unimaginable things which I cannot describe here.

SMOOGLE: Is that so? Have you tried using Smoogle Prome?

Me: The browser? I do have it. But I use Sopera mostly. Prome has mostly copied Sopera’s functionality and it’s such a big download.

SMOOGLE: How so?

Me: Sopera is a small 9 MB package. Prome is 30 MB at least.

SMOOGLE: You don’t get it dear, do you?

Me: What er… don’t I get?

SMOOGLE: We’re a ‘big package’ for good reason. Remember, you said Macrosoft is going to stop support for SP?

Me: Yes. I’m feeling really let down and dreading all the malicious software I’ve to deal with.

SMOOGLE: We told you we’re the friendly neighbourhood guys. We don’t do devil. We give away everything for free.

Me: What are you saying?

(SMOOGLE to himself –This poor guy still doesn’t get it that we always had the dream of world domination. Convincing himself: And we do so by not doing devil.).

SMOOGLE: The reason Prome is so much heavier than Sopera is because it was designed to be a very light:weight replacement for the Macrosoft OS itself!

Me: Really? That’s genius. How so?

SMOOGLE: What do you use your laptop for, on a daily basis?

Me: Browsing, checking emails, listening to music, creating documents etc.

SMOOGLE: You can do all that from the Prome browser itself.

Me: Really? That’s cool man!

SMOOGLE: You already know which is the fastest browser, don’t you?

Me: It’s Sopera. They have Turbo search.

SMOOGLE: God. You still don’t get it do you?

Me: What?

SMOOGLE: What do ‘most people perceive’ to be the fastest browser?

Me: Prome, I guess.

SMOOGLE: Duh!!!, it has to be, Why on earth does it have the highest number of users?

Me: Because, most of them haven’t really tried Sopera or even heard of it?

SMOOGLE: Are you a Sopera fan boy or what? Let me explain. The turbo feature will be part of Prome soon.

Me: There you go again. Sopera has had it for over two years now. So much so, Scrapple offers it as a choice along with Zafari because it’s incredibly fast.

(SMOOGLE to itself –I know. We should have spent less time with our strategy for world domination and should have copied the turbo feature earlier just like we and the Firefrog guys copied the tabs feature from Sopera)

SMOOGLE: Listen carefully. Our competition is not with Sopera. They’re way too good!

Me: Thanks for acknowledging. Also, Google search could easily rename itself as wikipedia search or torrent search. But granted, you do a great job of indexing and serving up the results really fast!

SMOOGLE: I’ll tell you why we’re superior! Sopera is European. Which means, they don’t seem to have a strategy for anything at all, forget one for world domination like us, Americans! In fact Americans have a strategy for world domination hard coded into their genes. Only if Hamsung and the Chinese were to step aside!

Me: Is that so? But why should I care about your strategy or theirs? Isn’t it all supposed to be about the best user experience?

SMOOGLE: I know, that’s very important too. We just have a much better way of delivering the same. We want to be your replacement when evil Macrosoft removes support for SP.

Me: OK. How do you do that?

SMOOGLE: What is your favourite email?

Me: It’s FeMail.

SMOOGLE: Well, have you tried the offline FeMail Prome app? Try it. You no longer have to use Shoutlook.

Me: OK.

SMOOGLE: There’s more. Have you ever used Smoogle Docks? That’s like using Macrosoft Ofish but with online collaboration and cloud storage like Smoogle Thrive and it’s all for free.

Me: That’s fantastic. I don’t really want to pay for the expensive Ofish 2013 upgrade anyways.

SMOOGLE: There you go! That’s really smart! Now, for the best part. We’re allowing for editing bdf and Ofish documents and we’re giving you access to all this through an offline Prome app.

Me: Holy cow!!

SMOOGLE: Yup.

Me: You mean to say, I don’t have to bother installing a new OS from Macrosoft. I can simply use Prome?

SMOOGLE: And you thought only Sopera was smart? Now you’re thinking more like Smoogle! Did you forget, we already have the Prome OS ready for use? In fact we have it pre-installed in some laptops as well. Although, as of now we’re in competition with Macrosoft Herface for the worst hardware sales ever in history! I think even Blueberry 10 did better!

Me: I guess Smoogle should simply stick to cloud and software. By the way, are you saying that, instead of using Dingdows 7 or 8, I could simply use Prome OS which now also has offline functionality?

SMOOGLE: Duh!!! We’re already giving you offline access for most things through the Prome browser. Isn’t that like inevitable, ultimately? The future is so Smoogly. From our part, it makes little difference if you use Smoogle via the Prome browser or the Prome OS or even Mandroid for that matter. As long as you use Smoogle in some way that is…… Why do you need anything else?

Me: God, that’s a real strategy for world domination!

SMOOGLE: Don’t worry. Relax! We’re not being evilly. After all, we’re giving it all away for free!

Me: Yes, that’s true. But the strategy for……

SMOOGLE: Like I said, why worry when you’re getting all of it for free? Would you like to pay individually for the Macrosoft OS and Ofish 2013 apart from all other paid software?

Me: I guess that’s fair too. Macrosoft dominated the OS & browser market and also got paid for it. At least you’re doing it for free.

SMOOGLE: I told you, we don’t do evil. We give away our software for free. I wonder why people are still so suspicious of us! Those evil Macrosoft guys must be funding an aggressive smear campaign against us.

Me: I guess it’s fair. Smoogle is in fact the friendly neighbourhood guy who does things for free!

SMOOGLE: See. That proves we don’t do evil! And yes, thanks for helping us make this world a better, beautiful place, ahem.. more Smoogly place.

(Me to Myself –Isn’t that what I wanted, everything for free? Why bother even if that’s more about Smoogle than everyone else. Evil Macrosoft is so dead! And I’ve got my OS replacement in the form of Prome OS for free. So the bad guys won’t steal my passwords. Couldn’t have got a better bargain. After all it’s all for FREE)

7 Essential Habits To Survive Your First Month At Work

noreply@blogger.com (Chetan Pinto) — Mon, 28 Jan 2013 09:38:00 +0000

Cross-posted from Superstar Employee my employee empowerment blog

Are you just beginning your career? Have you newly joined this company having served in a different company? The following tips will help you adapt quickly to your new workplace and avoid unnecessary culture adjustment problems.

Understand Rules Of The Buddy System

There is company specific lingo and codewords you’ll be expected to learn in order to make friends with other people. Don’t ask anyone directly. They will neither share or appreciate your curiosity. If you had similar experiences at school trying to blend in and making friends, the workplace is no different. If at all, your colleagues are far more competitive and insecure. So tread slowly and intelligently - Try to figure it out indirectly by befriending a senior over coffee.

Don’t Try To Be An Expert.

Your seniors have much more experience in the company and know how it functions. So, don’t try to be an expert. If you see problems with the way things are run, do not complain even to a polite colleague or senior because they are trying to figure you out just as you’re trying to figure them out! Complaints can wait at least till the end of the probationary period.

To Avoid Confusion and Misunderstanding Learn To Clarify and Rephrase

Try to solve technical, work-related issues without taking too much help from your seniors. Learn to clearly ask what you want from them or what they want from you in order to avoid unnecessary confusion. Rephrase before parting just to make sure both you and your co-worker are in agreement over the issue.

Figure Out The Correct Procedures Yourself

As far as possible, try to understand the rules and procedures without taking too much help from others. However, in case of exceptional circumstances like sexual misconduct or bullying, try contacting the HR or the designated Complaints cell or ask a polite senior about ‘the right procedure’.

Do Not Ask Advice From A Peer

Your colleague could be just as new as you and is equally inexperienced. Try to figure it out yourself, ask the HR or your team leader- in that order. Be polite but firm and try to be helpful. Find potential people who will look out for you in times of trouble and begin making inroads into creating relationships by taking them for coffee.

Stay Neutral. Don’t Create Groups Or Join One.

REMEMBER, you have joined the company to further your career. So focus on bettering your skills rather than ‘reforming’ the company or fellow individuals.

LEARN TO NOT COMPROMISE ON YOUR WEEKENDS

Come early, stay back late if necessary but never agree to work on weekends. Cite personal, family or medical problems if necessary. Offer to do the work during the weekdays by staying back late if necessary.

Weekends are for you to enjoy with friends and family. You have earned it!

Follow all the suggestions for a month and see the results for yourself. Let me know how it works out for you! Share any other tips or secrets you learnt.

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Design Rainmaking Sales Pitch, Presentations around ONE BIG IDEA- Learn How.

noreply@blogger.com (Chetan Pinto) — Wed, 02 Jan 2013 05:42:00 +0000

Be it a student presentation at school, convincing a venture capital (VC) firm to fund your startup idea or selling a multi-million dollar CRM software to an MNC, the process essentially starts with a presentation. Although the preferred mode for presenting is through power points, a high impact presentation requires good speaking skills as well.

Steve Jobs presenting the iPhone 4 in San Francisco on June 7, 2010 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Now to the real facts! After reading hundreds of books, blogs and the Harvard Business Review I was able to assimilate the core principles that go into the making of a successful, rainmaking presentation. It turns out, the secret sauce to making a rainmaking pitch is trying to convey a simple message that encapsulates One BIG IDEA- a keystone idea that unlocks the entire presentation.

Each of the strategies I’ll teach will help you refine your pitch into One BIG IDEA and convey it in an effective, artistic manner. It will work even if you aren’t gifted with exceptional speaking skills as the strategy essentially focuses on preparation and repeating the ONE BIG IDEA.

So, let’s get started.

Do You Believe In the Idea?

Before making a presentation ask yourself, how strongly do you believe in the idea? Are you passionate and excited about it? A lot of presentations are ineffective because the audience feels you don’t care about the idea seriously enough.

Belief is very important. If you lack conviction while presenting, your clients will see through your body language as Amy Cuddy of Harvard Business School explains here-

‘you have to build trust before you can lead. I know this may seem to contradict what I say about power posing, but it absolutely doesn’t. It’s really important to separate what you do before the interaction, from what you do during the interaction. You want to feel powerful going in – but that does not equal dominant or alpha. You want to feel that you have the power to bring your full, spirited self to the situation, stripped of the fears and inhibitions that might typically hold you back. I believe this allows you not just to be stronger, but also to be more open and trusting. I’m definitely not an advocate, as I think I’ve made clear by now, of going in and power-posing in front of people in order to intimidate them or something.’

How to Get Your ONE BIG Idea?

Once you know you believe that your idea has the potential to change things, you need to clearly explain why and how your idea can revolutionize or transform things for the client. The best way to do this is through a process of selection and elimination.

Most sales people make a big mistake by using the oldest trick in the book- by talking about cost savings to the company. Although a compelling idea, good clients often want to know the technicalities of how such cost savings are made possible and how it makes their product/service is so very different from their competition as a result.

Often times, there’s no such ‘holy grail’ breakthrough product and the client quickly sees through your gimmick. Therefore a far better way to pitch yourself is by finding out your client’s genuine needs and tailoring your presentation to suit their expectations. This means using as a carefully calibrated, personalized approach instead of a one size fits all, cookie cutter.

It’s not as difficult as it sounds provided you follow this simple strategy with discipline and focus -

The Two Step Focus Approach

strategy (Photo credit: Sean MacEntee)

Presentation Ideas = Core Competence (Product + Service) + Research (Client+ Competition)

ONE BIG IDEA= Elimination/Selection for FOCUS - Presentation Ideas

First, get to know your client’s expectations better. Find out what exactly they are looking for. I’m assuming you’ve already done your homework getting to know your competitor’s product/service and USP. Then combine it with what you believe are your company’s and also the particular product’s core strengths.

Next, put yourself in your clients’ shoes. If you know your client well enough, what would he think about your idea, your presentation? What would appeal to him? Or would he think it was a waste of his time. Use this strategy to eliminate irrelevant information. Remember, process of elimination leads to a process of selection and enables a sharper focus on the ONE BIG IDEA.

Rehearse and Repeat

People say, you need to propose an idea at least six times before it can be considered seriously. So if you were to make a presentation, how would you apply this idea to your presentation?

Brendon and Sam working with their clients Tim and Thomi (Photo credit: Samuel Mann)

Once you’ve focused your presentation to suit the client’s expectations, the next step is to rehearse. Experts point out that it takes about an hour to prepare a minutes’ worth of presentation. Why? The aim is to understand how each slide/idea individually and collectively fits the client’s expectation. Therefore, preparation is key.

Once you’re finished with the ‘fit part’ next comes the EMPHASIS i.e conveying your key message i.e your ONE BIG IDEA as many times and in as many INTERESTING ways as possible. Trust me, if you are confident and throw in some humour, you have got their attention. Just make sure that the presentation does not become so entertaining that the big idea is lost in the process.

When everything else fails, Use the Steve Jobs’ Effect

Image via CrunchBase

It’s not always easy to find ‘actionable intelligence’ about your client or competition although there are simple rules to systematically understand it provided you invest enough into strategy and research. But a small company or an individual employee lacking these resources can use the Steve Jobs’ techniques for emoting and personalizing your pitch or presentation.

Steve Jobs’ presentations were noted for being clear, simple and interesting. They were also understated and dramatic. Steve Jobs also believed that a great piece of technology is created when art and science intersect. I believe the same should be true about every pitch or presentation.

Ask yourself ‘What’s your story?’ ‘Does it have the potential to emote/move the client?’ There are many ways of narrating and unraveling your BIG IDEA. Below are three famous ones-

Build Up Then Reveal Strategy

Try the ‘build up expectation and reveal the idea’ a strategy the Bard uses by giving away the plot in order to create curiosity in Macbeth. Shakespeare reveals his fate through the witches in the beginning of the play with chilling effect - ‘Fair is foul and foul is fair’ and then by telling Macbeth ‘Thou shalt get kings, though thou be none’ thus keeping the audience hooked to how the play actually unfolds to reveal Macbeth’s tragic end.

Points Of View Strategy

You could use the ‘points of view’ strategy as brilliantly exemplified by the movie ‘Citizen Kane’ by Orson Welles where depending on who they are and how they have known him, the audience gets a different story of Citizen Kane.

Scenario Visualization Strategy

Charles Dickens’ brilliantly portrays to Ebenezer Scrooge in his novel ‘Christmas Carol’ the true spirit of Christmas using the dramatic ‘scenario visualization’ strategy by picturing Scrooge’s life through the ghosts of ‘Christmas Past’, ‘Christmas Present’ and ‘Christmas Future’.

All in all, presentation is the art of pitching a story to a client who in turn gets persuaded enough to back your product, idea or service. As long as you have established trust through your conviction and sold your story as ONE BIG IDEA that appeals to the audience at some level, you have got their attention.

Profit from Low Productivity by Checking Emails, Facebook after Lunch

noreply@blogger.com (Chetan Pinto) — Sun, 15 Apr 2012 11:07:00 +0000

This is a first in a new series of posts on increasing productivity.

Do you check emails and facebook updates every five minutes? Are you a ‘crackberry’ addict? Do you needlessly multi-task especially take notes while you surf the net? Do you eat lunch at your desk? Do you make calls while you're driving, and even send the occasional text?

By doing so you split your attention, so that you're partially engaged in multiple activities but rarely fully engaged in any one. In part, it's because when you switch away from a primary task to do something else, you're increasing the time it takes to finish that task by an average of 25 per cent.

Tony Schwartz the well-known authority on productivity says-

I get 2-3 times as much writing accomplished when I focus without interruption for a designated period of time and then take a real break, away from my desk. The best way for an organization to fuel higher productivity and more innovative thinking is to strongly encourage finite periods of absorbed focus, as well as shorter periods of real renewal.

Simply by avoiding technology distractions you can achieve higher productivity. So, this is what I suggest you do.

Image via CrunchBase

Try to check your emails and Facebook during low productive times especially after lunch in the afternoon specifically 2 and 3.
Try scheduling your calls during this time using your mobile voicemail service. Ask your colleagues and manager to co-operate with you if possible.

However, do not make your manager and colleagues an excuse for not trying as much as you can on your own to avoid technological distractions.

Remember, a habit usually takes about three weeks to stick and become routine.

With a little bit of discipline you should be able to accomplish your first task easily.

Good Luck!

The Best Learning and Education Resources are all Free!

noreply@blogger.com (Chetan Pinto) — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 17:08:00 +0000

TED Talks

TED's mission statement begins:

TED (conference) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

We believe passionately in the power of ideas to change attitudes, lives and ultimately, the world. So we're building here a clearinghouse that offers free knowledge and inspiration from the world's most inspired thinkers, and also a community of curious souls to engage with ideas and each other.

TED addresses a wide range of topics within the research and practice of science and culture. The speakers are given a maximum of 18 minutes to present their ideas in the most innovative and engaging ways they can. Past presenters include Bill Clinton, Jane Goodall, Malcolm Gladwell, Al Gore, Richard Dawkins, Bill Gates, educator Salman Khan, Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, and many Nobel Prize winners.

Since June 2006, TED Talks have been made available online on the websites of TED, YouTube, and iTunes and since late 2009, there have been free apps for iOS (iPhone, iPad), Android, webOS and Windows Phone 7.

You can start with the Most Popular TED talks

Internet (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Harvard Business Review – offers the following for free

HBR blog
3 free articles per month from Harvard Business Review on signing up for free. You’ll get a monthly email as soon as the next issue is published and you will be able to read any three articles of your choice.
Monthly email newsletters on innovation, best practices, technology etc.
Daily Management tip - for every management ad you’ll have to put up with two email ads.

Khanacademy

With a library of over 3,000 videos covering everything from arithmetic to physics, finance, and history and 315 practice exercises, Khanacademy is on a mission to help you learn what you want, when you want, at your own pace. Major topics covered are-

Math
Brain Teasers
Science
Healthcare and Medicine
Physics
Humanities & Other History
Art History
Test Prep

Khanacademy is also available as an IPad app.

Teacher and administrators can explore Teacher Resources

MIT Open CourseWare - is an initiative of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) to put all of the educational materials from its undergraduate- and graduate-level courses online, partly free and openly available to anyone, anywhere. As of November 2011, over 2080 courses were available online. While a few of these are limited to chronological reading lists and discussion topics, a majority provided homework problems and exams (often with solutions) and lecture notes. Some courses also include interactive web demonstrations in Java, complete textbooks written by MIT professors, and streaming video lectures.

OCW video and audio files are provided in full for offline downloads on iTunesU and the Internet Archive.
OCW introduced an iPhone App called LectureHall
Check out the RSS feed of new courses

Other Valuable Sources

List of free educational video websites

TED- Ed - TED-Ed's mission is to capture and amplify the voices of great educators around the world. They do this by pairing extraordinary educators with talented animators to produce a new library of curiosity-igniting videos. Check out the best TED Talks for Kids here

Logo (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Project Gutenberg- has the largest collection of out of print and out of copyright books. It is now available for download an epub which is an mp3 like standard for reading books on any digital device like a tablet or smartphone.

Get started by checking out the most popular books and download them from here

Virtual Labs – is a project initiated by the Government of India with the objective of using the Internet to make up for the inadequate laboratory infrastructure in colleges in the State, with particular focus on rural colleges. 91 lab experiments, covering nine broad areas, have been developed by 12 institutes from across the country. Apart from seven Indian Institutes of Technology (Delhi, Bombay, Kanpur, Kharagpur, Madras, Roorkee and Guwahati), International Institute for Information Technology-Hyderabad, Amrita University, Dayalbagh University, National Institute of Technology Karnataka (NITK), and College of Engineering, Pune, developed the experiments that were subsequently uploaded.

Image via CrunchBase

Check out Virtual Labs here

Last but definitely one of the best- Wikipedia

Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia contains more than 20 million articles in 282 languages. The parent company, Wikimedia Foundation also runs the following free initiatives:

Wikibooks contains a collection of free educational textbooks and learning materials.
Wikimedia Commons contains a free to use repository of images, sounds, videos and general media, containing over 12 million files.
Wikiversity contains several educational and research materials and activities
Wikimedia India is the Indian edition of Wikimedia.

Popular Posts:

Howard Gardner- Each Child is different and needs to be taught differently

noreply@blogger.com (Chetan Pinto) — Thu, 22 Mar 2012 16:12:00 +0000

(Cross- posted from Eduprentice, my Education specific blog)

The Good Work Team: William Damon, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi and Howard Gardner (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

If I were the international ‘czar' of education, I would focus the assessments on two areas: l) Can the student demonstrate understanding in and across the major disciplines —that is, scientific understanding, historical understanding, artistic/humanistic understanding, and mathematical understanding? This is best done by providing new unfamiliar examples/problems/concepts, and have the students explicate them; 2) Are the young people becoming moral and ethical citizens? This cannot be determined by standardised tests; it requires inspection of representative campuses as well as the collecting of statistics about voting patterns, crime rates, engagement in social service and other indices of good citizenship.

The best educational systems in the world, like Finland, make heroic efforts to provide quality education for every child. That means spending more resources for disadvantaged children, and I support that decision. In both the United States and India, there are vast differences in resources and, in the long run, that does not make for a healthy society.

Individual learners are not all the same and they should not be treated as if they are. That is where my theory of multiple intelligences figures in educational design. The two most important implications of the theory are Individuation and Pluralisation. Individuation means presenting lessons in ways that are compatible with the child's ways of learning and giving the child the opportunity to show what he/she has learned and understood. Pluralisation means presenting important content in a variety of ways, not just via lecture or reading. If we pluralise our means of presentation, we reach more students and we also demonstrate what it is like really to understand materials — to be able to think of them in multiple ways.

Parents need to avoid positive and negative narcissism. Positive narcissism says “The one thing that I could do is play the violin. Therefore you must play the violin.” Negative narcissism says “The one thing that I could not do is play the violin. Therefore, you must play the violin.” The challenge is to watch your children very carefully, see what interests and excites them, and find ways to help them follow that talent/passion/curiosity. This does not mean ignoring what is important in school, but it does mean realising that life is more than school, and that finding one's passion can make the difference between a fulfilled life and a frustrating life.

(Excerpts from Howard Gardner’s interview to The Hindu)

How Can Facebook Benefit By Launching a Business Network? Ten Reasons

noreply@blogger.com (Chetan Pinto) — Tue, 06 Mar 2012 07:07:00 +0000

Facebook has 800 million + users and growing. It’s got a fun user interface and helps people get connected through a host of powerful features like photo tagging, face recognition, newsfeed and chat and the controversial timelines feature. It’s also available on any digital device be it a mobile phone, IPad or a laptop. Imagine, if Facebook were to offer a private communication platform for companies, these fun and powerful features could literally be used to improve productivity, drive innovation and enhance customer experience for businesses. Read how-

1. A fun and secure employee engagement tool

Facebook Business (Photo credit: Sean MacEntee)

Employee engagement is the buzz word these days. Employees already spend a lot of time connecting with friends. What if they could instead connect with other employees and colleagues at work, get to know each others’ interests, and collaborate on projects in the same fun social way in a closed business environment? Provided Facebook takes care of privacy issues, it can monetize its customers not through advertising as they do so now, but by providing a secure communication platform for employees and businesses to engage and communicate. It’s a win-win for businesses and Facebook as Facebook gets a new revenue model and the companies get a secure and fun communication platform to do business and engage their employees a privilege for which companies would be more than happy to pay.

2. Advantages of hierarchical and flat structure for businesses

Corporations and companies having more than fifty employees have a hierarchical or a matrixed structure. Almost every employee complains about bureaucracy in their company which leads to a lot of delays in getting things done. A Facebook like platform will provide a virtual flat structure over and above the existing hierarchical structure . The result would be a hybrid model of organization that would enable both top-down and bottoms-up communication. Companies and corporations could thus benefit from both hierarchical and flat structure organization.

3. New possibilities of engagement and talent discovery

Employees regardless of which process or department they belong to will get a new tool to interact, participate and contribute to their company’s growth- be it in a promotional campaign, product design, customer experience, CSR or through the company’s social platform. An employee who is eager to contribute to another domain within the company will get an opportunity to do so. Like-minded employees will find it easy to come together to discover and share their interests and create products and innovations. Better collaboration would contribute to increased productivity.

Image via CrunchBase

4. Prioritizes Communication And Collaboration Over ERP

Employees, vendors and distributors do not have to understand the ERP software provided by SAP, Oracle or Salesforce.com. A communication and collaboration tool like Facebook for business could be the primary platform of engagement and ERP like apps, extensions and add-ons like Google docs could be built around it to share data, graphics, statistics or analytics anytime, anywhere and through any device with other employees and vendors in a secure environment.

5. Massive Cost Benefits

ERP packages are very expensive. Even a cloud-based ERP solution like Salesforce.com charges 125$ per person per month for their premium package and over 250$ for an unlimited package. Salesforce.com makes a big deal out of the chat and Google Docs integration with the Salesforce cloud and sells it as a premium service! Imagine, if Facebook were to offer its existing services to businesses even for say, 25$ per user per month let alone 250$, I believe Facebook will ultimately make more money through business service licensing than it now does through advertising.

6. Diversified Revenue Stream

Face book has to constantly tinker with people’s privacy settings as it is heavily dependent on its users to sell advertising. The users do not pay anything to access Facebook’s powerful features. With a SaaS cloud-based business service, Facebook can take care of the monetization problem forever.

7. Taking on the Competition

LinkedIn’s Reid Hoffman, whom everyone worships as the monetization guru for social platforms could eventually get into selling LinkedIn as a cloud-based business communication and transaction platform. Even Amazon which already has Amazon Web Services (AWS) cloud that rents server space and offers Enterprise Cloud Computing services could get into the act just as it has got into book publishing. Remember, Amazon has its own exclusive device in the form of the kindle. With internet going mobile, technology leaders like Apple, Google and Amazon already have a headstart because of their tablet devices and smartphones. Moreover startups like Red Rover have already begun offering the exact same services I’m talking about. (Of course all Facebook needs to do is simply acquire such a company!) With such intense competition, Facebook cannot afford to wait for too long.

8. +1 with Google search more powerful than Facebook Like

(Photo credit: sitmonkeysupreme)

Facebooks’s like button and its Open Graph strategy is very likely to see a serious threat from Google’s +1 button. As I have argued previously here, Google’s relationship with websites and blogs through its Adwords and Adsense program incentivizes the use of +1 over Face book’s like button because of the positive effects it will have on Google’s search rankings and hence the website’s business, monetization and popularity. Moreover as Google+ itself getting popular as a social network, businesses could give preference to Google simply because it is a one stop shop for everything online!

9. The looming Google+ threat

Although Google+ has not positioned itself as a Facebook killer, it likes to see itself as the dominant communication and user engagement platform by integrating search with

Entertainment through games and Youtube
Collaboration through hangouts and circles and
Information through Google News and Google Reader.

Facebook has never before seen such a direct and compelling threat to its platform.

10. Bing + Office Cloud as the best option for Facebook’s Business Network Strategy

Google already has introduced apps for businesses and has started monetizing it. And it has got Android. Facebook has an excellent and an insanely popular communication platform and using Microsoft’s Office cloud, it could offer a similar service. Microsoft

Image by Getty Images via @daylife

is already an investor in Facebook.

Moreover, businesses are already familiar with the Office Suite of applications. That’s a win-win. I’m pretty sure Steve Ballmer will be jumping up and down in excitement when he hears this especially as he sees Google eating more and more of Microsoft’s lunch first through Google Docs and now through Android.

The best part about all this is that Facebook can take care of privacy and monetization issues with a single move of launching/acquiring a business network. Mark Zuckerberg may want to consider these suggestions seriously as they are getting ready to go public with an IPO.

Popular Posts

How To Deal With Difficult People? Updated

noreply@blogger.com (Chetan Pinto) — Tue, 28 Feb 2012 08:34:00 +0000

Provocation brings the worst out of people. However when somebody shouts at us, behaves rudely or provokes us in any way, we should remember it is not our problem or our fault. Nor do we deserve to be treated that way! The best way to resolve any problem is to discuss it calmly, especially when both parties or individuals are in a relaxed state of mind. Most of us know this. But difficult people are everywhere, at the workplace, on the road (policemen especially), in a shopping mall, even at home. Is there an effective way of disarming such people and such situations? Read on.

There are ways in which behaviour we consider rude or provocative can be easily taken care of.For eg: If the customer is rude to you, you can calmly say, ‘I would do your work even if you do not shout at me!’

If on the other hand, the shop owner or the assistant is rude to you and you have no way of complaining? Worse still, you have already bought what you needed, you are short of time or you bought the stuff because it is cheaper here. What then? Should you put up with such rude behaviour or worse get provoked? There is no easy answer to these questions. So, let’s analyse it a little and understand why the store assistant is behaving rudely.

The store assistant may deliberately want to drive away customers because he/she is unhappy with the work and pay conditions. Happens.

The store assistant is inexperienced and cracks under pressure. Happens.(Lack of training in business is suicidal for business especially with respect to an inexperienced employee especially if such employees are asked to interact with customers directly)

We as customers are too demanding. Happens

Try sending back food in a restaurant and be prepared to eat food that is well, unique! (Spit on, or worse, urinated upon! Rest assured, you will never know!)

You should know that if the food is bad, it is not the waiter’s mistake. Being rude to the waiter doesn’t help. If you do not know how to send food back calmly, please do not! But if you want to try something different, here are two ideas:

If you are lucky, you can get that waiter replaced.
Tip the waiter in advance instead of in the end. Don’t keep him guessing!

People tend to lose their cool more often than not, in many different ways. Driving during busy hours, overtaking, even displaying our religious beliefs in public-

Do you go to the church/mosque regularly?
Do you fast during Lent/Ramadan?
We fast more than your religion…… or
Who goes to church these days?

For people with strongly held beliefs, this is provocation enough. Learn to listen more and speak less especially if it involves sensitive topics like I discussed above. There are people called ‘Creationists’ who have trouble accepting that evolution as a scientific fact!

Let me assure you that it is not the religion doing the talking! It is the ego thinly disguised in a religious theme reinforced by a conservative upbringing. How to test this? Just ask them what books they read or what kind of stuff they watch or browse on the internet and you will get the whole story!!

Unfortunately, such people (which includes most of us!) think there is nothing wrong about what we say and because we think so, we can never really learn to improve. Because, becoming a better person a good communicator means acknowledging that there is something wrong with us in the first place. In order to do this, we need to put our ego and our pride behind us and learn to do the right thing. Nobody will bother to help us if we are too full of ourselves and unwilling to listen and change. Instead we risk losing even our closest friends and will most likely be branded as a 'difficult person'.

At workplace we encounter similar difficult situations. The atmosphere becomes stifling especially if company policies related to pay and promotion are not clear or worse arbitrarily implemented or perceived as so! If the HR managers or team leaders give in to favouritism or are even perceived as doing so, the entire morale of the company suffers and it should brace itself for a eventual catastrophe! Because, instead of working in the best interest of the company, the employees start plotting against other employees in order to save their job or get a promotion. Read my post on improving employee engagement here.

If you are an employee of such a company or perceive that you are, remember these:

Four Things To Know About Difficult/Rude/Angry People

Such people indicate a lack of maturity in dealing with problems. So there is no point arguing! They have to learn in their own time. But you can help them be aware of their problems politely!

Ego is almost always counter-productive unless of course the person shows integrity/self-respect, self-confidence and/or an independent point of view.

Rudeness is an attitude problem. People resort to it only when they can get away with it unscathed! They also resort to it if they think they have nothing to lose or they perceive you have a weak personality!

If your response is calm but not weak, you can easily disarm such people. For eg: tell them, ‘I’ll help you even if you aren’t rude/angry/difficult with me’. That’s it!

Telling them how bad you feel makes it clear to them that you are hurt by their rude behaviour. By offering to help them you exhibit great emotional intelligence and a willingness to forgive and forget. This is essential to building trust! Congratulations in advance if you do this successfully! You are now part of his/her trusted circle. Just remember, this is not a short term fix but should reflect in your entire behaviour.

Read this book

Companies and self employed individuals can adopt a brilliant strategy in their written correspondence -

DO NOT RESPOND if the emails are rude, provocative or seeking attention in any way. Any good company should make this clear as part of their official policy!
This email response policy can also be followed by all professionals and self-employed people who repond to a large number of mails, especially unsolicited ones and those from new customers .

So, whenever dealing with difficult people you can successfully use a mix of these two strategies successfully:

Ignore rude/angry behaviour if you can afford to.
If you cannot, tell the person, ‘I’ll help you even if you aren’t rude/angry with me’.

Do you have any other strategies of dealing with difficult people and situations? Do let me know what you think.

Related Articles:

More Interesting Articles:

How to successfully negotiate for a raise? Watch these Ramit Sethi Videos

noreply@blogger.com (Chetan Pinto) — Sat, 25 Feb 2012 18:49:00 +0000

If you’ve always wondered how some people seem to know exactly what to say when it comes to getting a raise…while the rest of us sit there wondering, “So…how do I do this?” these videos are for you. In these videos, Ramit Sethi, the New York Times best-selling author of I Will Teach You To Be Rich teaches you how to successfully negotiate for a raise.

Other Popular Posts on A Simple Soul

Check out even more from the Most Popular Section

‘Seeks’ the Open Source Alternative to Scroogle: Should Google Be Worried?

noreply@blogger.com (Chetan Pinto) — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 21:14:00 +0000

In response to my post Great Privacy Search Alternatives to Scroogle one of my readers sent me the following comment:

‘Encrypted searches on Google will prevent people on your local network and/or your ISP/government from snooping on you, but will leave you wide open to Google's profiling. Scroogle prevented that.’ (As you may know by now, it is dead.)

As much as one may want to think of Google as a benevolent giant, its actions are looking increasingly suspect. From collecting data from via Google Street View cars to circumventing Safari's cookie policy, it is difficult to imagine Google would give up on tracking us especially because their business model depends on targeted advertising.

Google has many ways of profiling us from signing in to an account the most obvious, to cookies, to Google analytics because for them our collective profiles are worth too much. The Electronic Frontier Foundation has warned that despite allowing us to disable our searches, Google may still be tracking us.

So what is the alternative?

If one wants privacy from a large centralised company, either they should use services from a smaller centralised company (lesser evil), or use a decentralised service.

Seeks is an open, P2P, decentralized platform for collaborative search, filtering and content curation. It believes that freedom in online search lies in the social treatment of information, not in the automated treatment of data. It does not matter who crawls the content, or who serves the results. What matters according to Seeks is:

· Privacy: be served anonymously;

· Freedom to control the results: edit, reject, share, rank;

· Freedom to trust who you search with, who influences your results, ….

Seeks tries to achieve this objective through a mix of machine learning and active user feedback.

To maintain privacy, Seeks allows to proxy you through to the search engine, so it does not see your IP address or browser header.

Seeks will also let you build rings of collaborative searchers, share, recommend stuff, modify results, and more.

Seeks implements a meta-search engine. Besides using its own database, Seeks can query a number of sources like:

search engines, such as Google, Bing, Blekko, Yahoo, Yauba, Exalead,
specialized websites such as Youtube, Dailymotion, Google images, Bing Images, Yahoo Images, Flickr,
microblogging platforms, such as Twitter and Identica
generic frameworks, such as Mediawiki, Dokuwiki, WordPress, Redmine,
standardized formats, such as OpenSearch, RSS, ATOM

Check it out: https://www.seeks-project.info/search.php/websearch-hp

Or use one of the public node (in https obviously) listed on:
http://seeks-project.info/wiki/index.php/List_of_Web_Seeks_nodes

There is also a firefox browser plugin available at:
https://gitorious.org/seeks-firefox/seeks-firefox/

The intended way to use Seeks is to install it on your own computer. It
will proxy searches to other search engines (the way it does normally) and will
create a profile to sharpen results for you. As the profile is local, no
profiling is done by companies, and you keep control of your search profile.

First, install Seeks. If you’re running into difficulties, be sure to check the Documentation.

Seeks is a non-profit initiative but they already have a funding mechanism in place to keep themselves going in the form of Seeks pro an enterprise search tool. These guys seem to be here for the long run and will not be disappearing anytime soon which would be a prerequisite if one wants to take on the well-entrenched, deep-pocketed competition.

Seeks aims to return the power of search to the users that Google has monopolised and dictated through its ranking system.

The question is will the privacy features and the collaborative nature of Seeks attract more privacy search users or will the ease of use offered by Google win over despite its privacy concerns.

(This post was made possible with contributions from one of my readers who likes to go by the pseudynym Thisisabore.)

How Much Does Google Know About You? Find Out and Delete! (Updated)

noreply@blogger.com (Chetan Pinto) — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 21:50:00 +0000

When you're signed in, Google personalizes your search experience based on your Web History. If you don't want to see results personalized based on your Web History while you're signed in, you can turn off Web History and remove it from your Google Account. You can also view and remove individual items, as well as pause your Web History.

	Signed-in search history personalization	Signed-out search history personalization
Where the data we use to customize is stored	In Web History, linked to your Google Account	On Google's servers, linked to an anonymous browser cookie
How far back we use search history	Indefinitely or until you remove it	Up to 180 days
What searches are used to customize	Only signed-in search activity, and only if you have Web History enabled	Only signed-out search activity
How to turn off	Turn off search history personalization ("Signed in searches" section)	Turn off search history personalization ("Signed out searches" section)

What does Google allow you to do?

Track Your Searches

You can track all your searches on a feed reader like Google reader. Copy paste the link- https://www.google.com/history/lookup?hl=en&st=blogs&output=rss . You may have to give your username and password depending on which feed reader you are using. After that you will be able to keep a track of every search that you have performed using your Google username.

Best Options To Quickly Access and Delete

Go to the Google Settings page-

Here you will be able to –

Delete profile and Google+ features
Delete entire Google account
View, enable, or disable web history

https://www.google.com/settings/

Recommended Option-

You can use the new Google dashboard to view almost all the Google products and services you are using including Gmail and GTalk and modify or delete any information you think Google should not know.

https://www.google.com/dashboard/

I advice all Google+ users to proactively control what they want others to see. Google+ allows you to make each and every element of your personal information public or private or only available to select circles.
Be careful while using the extended circles option. If in doubt do not disclose. Keep things private.
Remember your Google+ account is designed to be a public profile of yourself. You can keep it private if you wish.

However, if wisely used, your Google+ profile could be a great asset to further your professional ambition.

P.S- Important Update from the EFF:

Note that disabling Web History in your Google account will not prevent Google from gathering and storing this information and using it for internal purposes. It also does not change the fact that any information gathered and stored by Google could be sought by law enforcement.

With Web History enabled, Google will keep these records indefinitely; with it disabled, they will be partially anonymized after 18 months, and certain kinds of uses, including sending you customized search results, will be prevented. If you want to do more to reduce the records Google keeps, the advice in EFF's Six Tips to Protect Your Search Privacy white paper remains relevant.

If you have several Google accounts, you will need to do this for each of them.

Great Privacy Search Alternatives To Scroogle (Updated)

noreply@blogger.com (Chetan Pinto) — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 10:55:00 +0000

Scroogle has been down for more than three days now. My quest for an alternative to Scroogle has led me on a major online quest. I emailed Danny Sullivan of Searchengine Land for some alternatives to Scroogle. It turns out there are some. He was kind enough to email me back the following options:

https://duckduckgo.com/privacy.html

There’s also Ixquick:
https://www.ixquick.com/eng/privacy-policy.html

Ask Eraser might still operate:
http://sp.ask.com/en/docs/about/askeraser.shtml#1

Google Encrypted Search:
https://encrypted.google.com/

I‘ve settled down on two after checking them all out.

DuckDuckGo – full privacy searching and a cool new ‘infinite scrolling’ feature . i.e if we find the top ten search results on duckduckgo insufficient, all we need to do is scroll down. Duckduckgo instantaneously serves up more results. You can do so continuously until you find the results you want.
Check it out here. (Remember, duckduckgo is also available without the encrypted privacy feature)

Google Encrypted Search- This I feel is just like using Scroogle. I can search for upto 100 results at a time without signing on to Google. Moreover, Google allows us to completely disable our search results. Check out Google Encrypted Search here

(Note: The easiest way to ensure you are searching with privacy is to make sure https:// and NOT http:// is active. Alternately you will always notice a yellow lock symbol on the left-hand side of the address bar)

I found Ixquick too slow for my liking and Ask Eraser no longer works.

If you are really keen about privacy searching you need to check out this new, opensource, decentralized, collaborative search engine.

Let me know what you feel.

P.S- I've given detailed instructions on how to integrate DuckDuckGo and Google Encrypted Search into your favourite browser. Check it out here.

Google’s Warm Valentine’s Day Gesture - Blocking Scroogle

noreply@blogger.com (Chetan Pinto) — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 07:48:00 +0000

As you may have known, I discovered Scroogle was not working for several hours and shot off a letter to the Federal Trade Commission. I also informed several technology blogs about the same. I’m happy to report that Betabeat’s Adrianne Jeffries took it up seriously and wrote a post about it. Read it here. She also emailed Google for a response. Betabeat has received the following statement from Google.

“We do have automated systems to deter scraping or excessive queries to Google, and spikes in query traffic can cause issues for some sites”

(Scroogle continues to be down in case you are wondering. I’ve given a link below so you can check for yourself. )

For it’s part, Google has set right the personalised search results that I was complaining about. It now gives us an option to-

Hide personal search results
View only our personal search results
Carry on googling like normal

However, Google still does not give me the option to search for more than 10 results at a time without signing in. Scroogle does that with full privacy protection. (No longer, because it’s down)

There must be some reason why Google is so afraid of Scroogle that it has resorted to block the latter after 11 years. I have always believed that small is beautiful. Small and big species are all a part of the ecosystem, depend on each other for survival and need to co-exist peacefully.

If the small fish is eaten up by the big fish, one day the big fish will have nothing to eat at all. Then, in order to satiate its appetite it will have to resort to more evil and start attacking bigger species and ultimately humans.

Is Google on the same path with respect to privacy issues?

Meanwhile Scroogle continues to show the error message. Check it for yourself by entering a search term.

My Letter to the FTC. David and Goliath can co-exist peacefully!

noreply@blogger.com (Chetan Pinto) — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 06:58:00 +0000

To: antitrust@ftc.gov

Sub: Protesting against Google's monopolistic act of blocking Scroogle

Dear Sir/Ma'am,

A wonderful and secure search engine Scroogle, that was relying on Google to display results is being unfairly blocked. Read my previous post - Scroogle is being blocked by Google. If Google did have problems with Scroogle, it should not have allowed the latter to exist in the first place, for seven years! Google has now suddenly blocked Scroogle without an explanation. Is it not Google being self-serving and evil?

I'd kindly urge you to look into the matter and demand an explanation. Atleast, ask Google to explain and/or clarify the situation on the Official Google Blog.

I would like to formally register my protest of Google's monopolistic actions against the little Scroogle. I believe David and Goliath can co-exist peacefully together!

Thanks for your time.

Sincerely,

Chetan Pinto.

Please send a copy of this letter to the FTC at- antitrust@ftc.gov, if you too feel strongly about it.

Scroogle is being blocked by Google

noreply@blogger.com (Chetan Pinto) — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 06:24:00 +0000


Scroogle Blocked

Scroogle is currently being blocked by Google. Mail the Federal Trade Commission - antitrust@ftc.gov and complain!

Inspiring Story: How a poor fatherless kid became a successful blogger at 17

noreply@blogger.com (Chetan Pinto) — Mon, 13 Feb 2012 17:18:00 +0000

Have you ever heard about people dying? You probably have. Have you ever heard about living deads? You probably have, but the truth is you will hardly recognize most of these people when you see them. The truth you might not know is that the day you stop learning is they day you start dying. This in short is the story of my life.

I lost my father at a tender age of 7 and due to my father being rich it wasn’t until his death that I started seeing the other side of life. Every of my father’s friends and family members that are always visiting and asking when he was alive departed my family, and even my father’s relatives came and collected all my father’s properties. Life then became difficult, and feeding her six children from the meagre salary she earns became difficult for my mother: we started to sell our properties to make sure we’re fed, and literally, we became the type of people whom everyone has looked down to.

Being wise, sensitive and calculative is a very important part of life, yet many people miss it. Like many of you, I had fallen for many online scams (okay, not many because I followed this principle), I had been cheated by online survey, paid to click, paid to read and many other huge online sites a lot of newbies run to nowadays but one trait that fastened my journey to online success is that of being receptive to change. After failing with my first website, I went the route of online surveys, PTR and PTC sites and after failing at those I focused my efforts on blogging.

It doesn’t matter what you know or what you heard from a so called expert, always observe when something is not right. If you’ve worked on something and done your best for months while spending hundreds of hours on it every month without getting any significant result you should know it is time to quit and focus on something new. The fact that blogging is working for me doesn’t mean you should be a blogger. Try a strategy and focus all your efforts on it, if it doesn’t work you should be ready to change it no matter what others say.

What differentiates me from many of the newbies trying to make money online is that the moment I discovered the other strategies weren’t working I dropped every other strategy and I started to spend tens of hours online every day on the one that works (I still spend more than 10 hours online till date).

My point here is that succeeding online isn’t about being a jack of all trades and master of none but about being the best at whatever you do. There are far more people than you can compete with specializing on a strategy without getting results let alone when you decide to work on several strategies at the same time.

Zig Ziglar said, you can get anything you want in life by helping others get what they want, this is so true and you will hardly achieve success if you don’t start following that principle. There have been a lot of occasions where people have told me to launch one of my free ebooks as a paid ebook, telling me people will pay for it, and there have been a lot of occasions where I saw opportunities like this, yet I didn’t make use of it. The reason is because I have a superior motivation for blogging, which is to help people, and I never for once thought about the consequences of not making money from my blog or how much efforts I have invested on my blog for the first 8 months without getting any results (or so it seems).

I have also noticed that writing content or planning to help people doesn’t even work nowadays. People need to see that you’re the right person to help them, that you’re the only one who has what they need and the only way they can see this is by you being transparent with them. I never realized the importance of being transparent until after it has made a major impact on my blogging career – my most popular posts on this blog are those that are more personal, revealing and transparent, and these are also my most successful posts.

The post that brought me my major client (with whom I now make an average of $4000 online monthly – or more, depending on how hard I work) was that on how I wrote over 280 guest posts in 8 months. The most popular posts for this year are my income and traffic reports and other posts of mine that are more transparent and practical are also highly successful.

You have to prove to people that you know what you’re talking about before they can listen to you. In a nutshell, helping them isn’t enough but proving to them that you’re indeed the right person to help them.

I don’t care what your background is because it doesn’t matter, I don’t care what your country is because it doesn’t matter (Nigeria is one of the countries that makes it very difficult for citizens to succeed online) but I strongly believe you will never succeed until you say and live by the saying My country will never be an excuse for my failure, My background will never be an excuse for my failure.

You should also know that everything starts from the mind and the best way to nurture your great dreams is by keeping yourself updated and by surrounding yourself with positive people, not by using your mouth or mind to make yourself believe you can’t achieve your desired results.

Read his complete story here. (I may not agree with all of his life’s philosophy except what I’ve chosen to mention here. He’s one inspiring kid nonetheless!)

17 Fun and Easy Ways to Improve Your Language

noreply@blogger.com (Chetan Pinto) — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 21:26:00 +0000

It is important to know that although this post talks about improving your English, you can use the suggestions given below to learn and improve any foreign language.

1. Have English radio on in the background while you are doing your housework. Even if you are not listening carefully, it will help you get a feel for natural English rhythm and intonation.

2. Teach your children or friends some English. Recent research has shown that elder children tend to be a couple of IQ points above their younger siblings, and the most likely reason is that explaining things to their little brothers and sisters gives them an intellectual boost. In the same way, teaching someone lower level than you the English you already know is a great way of permanently fixing that knowledge in your own brain.

3. Listen to MP3s. Not many people know that you can download speech radio such as audio books (an actor reading out a novel) and speech radio. Not only is this better practice for your English than listening to English music, from sources like Scientific American, BBC and Australia’s ABC Radio it is also free.

4. Say or think what you are doing in English as you do your daily tasks. As you are doing your chores, try creating sentences describing what you are doing, e.g. ‘I am unscrewing the ketchup bottle cap’. This gets you used to thinking in English without translating, and can be a good way of seeing what simple vocabulary that is around you everyday you don’t know. yet

5. Watch English language films with English subtitles. If it is too difficult to watch the whole film this way, try watching the (usually important) first 10 or 15 minutes of the film with subtitles in your own language, switch to English subtitles after that, and only switch back to subtitles in your own language if you get totally lost following the story of the film.

6. Watch the same film or TV episode over and over again. This will mean that you can really learn the language without having to study it. Some comedies can also get funnier the more you watch them, especially if you watch them with no subtitles and so understand a little more each time you watch it.

7. Be realistic about your level. One thing that holds many language learners back is actually trying too hard and tackling something that their brain is not ready for yet. Checking your level with a level check test on the internet, by taking an English language test (FCE, CAE, IELTS, TOEIC, TOEFL etc.), or by taking a free trial level check and/ or lesson in a language school will help you find out what your level is and so choose suitable self-study materials.

8. Be realistic about your reading level. Most researchers agree that people learn most when reading something they understand almost all of. If there are one or two words per page that you have never seen before, that is about the right level. If there are three or more difficult words on every page, you should switch to reading something easier and come back later.

9. Watching English children’s films or TV programmes. Although some of the vocabulary you can learn from things made for children can be a bit strange (lots of animal names and maybe animal noises, including baby names for things), the fact that not only the language but the structure of the story is simplified can make it an easy and motivating thing to watch. Like good language learning materials, the same language is also often repeated to make it memorable, and the use of catchy songs etc. can increase this positive effect on your memory.

10. Label things in your house or office with post-its. The easiest vocabulary to learn is the vocabulary of things you see and use everyday. If you can write the names of things around you on slips of paper and stick them on the real thing, this is a great way of learning useful vocabulary. If you can leave them there over the following days and weeks, this is a very easy way of revising the vocabulary until it is properly learnt.

11. Online chat. The closest thing to speaking for people who don’t have the chance to speak English is online chat, as you have to think and respond quickly, and the language is short and informal just like speech.

12. Listen to the radio news in English. You can make this easier by reading the news in English first, or even just by reading or listening to the news in your own language.

13. Record your own voice. For people who don’t have much or any correction of pronunciation from a teacher, recording yourself and listening back makes it easier to hear whether you are really making the English sounds that you are trying to or not.

14. Arrange a conversation exchange. Swapping lessons and conversation with someone who wants to learn your language can be a good alternative for those who aren’t looking for romance, or can sometimes lead onto dating for those who are!

15. Model your accent on one particular actor. e.g. try to speak like Robert De Niro. Students who say they want to sound more like a native speaker have the problem that native speakers don’t sound all that much like each other. Choosing one model can make the task of improving your pronunciation more clear, and is quite fun.

16. Use an English-English dictionary. Trying to use a bilingual dictionary less and switching to a monolingual one can help you to stop translating in you head when you are speaking or listening, and other useful English vocabulary can come up while you are using the dictionary.

17. Set goals. Deciding how many hours you want to study, how many words you want to learn or what score you want to get in a test are all good ways of making sure you do extra study.

(This is a shortened version of 70 ways to improve your English.)

Read my Four Essential Tips on Improving your Speaking and Writing

Avoiding Email Spam: How much are we to blame?

noreply@blogger.com (Chetan Pinto) — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 07:31:00 +0000

Update: BBC's Click programme featured a story on how cyber-criminals are using a sophisticated method to steal money from our bank accounts online on Saturday, Feb 4, 2012. Try and catch it before Sunday Feb 5th or go to the BBC Click section for more information. It is yet another proof of how important a good, updated anti-virus program is for our online security.

I recently sent a mass mail highlighting my monthly posts in which I also mentioned I would write about the tax benefits of life and health insurance products. Within 24 hours I get an unsolicited advertisement from an insurance company. How did the insurance company find out what I had written?

Last year, I had written a post about how one can get more job offers just by inserting relevant keywords in your resume/cv. Read the post here. It’s pretty obvious to me that spammers are using a similar keyword recognition technique to send targeted advertisements to email users. And it is using some of our own infected computers to send spam!

Firstly, some background. I sent my mass mail using Gmail. Google does not sell personal information to private parties as its business model depends on inserting relevant text ads alongside the mails we read. Google also has a powerful spam filter and it also allows us to report spam. So how did I get the very relevant advertisement despite that?

This is what I think happened. I sent a mass mailer that contained a lot of email addresses. Even if one of my recipient’s computer was infected with a virus, that computer could have been used as a zombie spam sending machine to automatically send spam to all the listed contacts. Cyber criminals use a network of such zombie computers called a ‘botnet’ in order to scan emails for keywords and send spam. In my case it was an ad related to insurance products.

You might get a travel or horoscope or some other tempting ads based on the keywords of your emails. The good news is that there is no need to be worried about cyber criminals. If we take some simple precautions like updating our anti-virus regularly, the criminals have no way of getting hold of our computers. It’s as simple as locking the door before leaving home!

Any internet user’s computer, at home or office, is vulnerable if the anti-virus program is not updated regularly. In fact office computers are notorious breeding grounds for ‘botnets’ because companies care more about profits than security and they have a habit of waiting for an unfortunate incident to happen before taking action. More over, our browsing habits also attract a lot of spam especially when we use our emails unnecessarily online. Also, cyber criminals are getting more and more intelligent. I was taken aback by how relevant the spam was to the mail I had sent!

So, as always, prevention is better than cure. And awareness is the key to prevention. Nobody educated me about the origin of spam. I know it because I’m interested in technology generally. I also watch BBC’s technology programme Click which almost a year back demonstrated how cyber criminals get hold of computers that do not have adequate anti-virus protection. The programme became controversial because Click got hold of a botnet of virus-infected computers even though it was for a brief period. It destroyed the botnet later.

There are simple ways of spam-proofing our emails. I encourage you to follow these guidelines for a spam-free email experience:

Use a good email service like Gmail. Do not delete suspicious mails and advertisements but use the report spam option. Google automatically moves all such mails to trash. Moreover you also help Google block spam proactively for other users! Advanced users can use filters to block specific emails.
You could use a service called boxbe that only allows emails after entering an alphanumeric code. Boxbe is a good trap against machine generated spam but not suitable for users who are expecting a genuine job offer from a company. If the company that sends you a job offer by email does not bother to enter the alphanumeric code as required by boxbe you will not receive your mail!
Use the BCC (Blind Carbon Copy) instead of To or CC option to send mass mailers to insulate yourself and others from infected computers. The BCC option allows you to send a group mail as if you are sending a personal mail.
Read my guide on how to protect your computer with a good browser, anti- virus and an anti-malware program using free programs. Read it here.

Share your experiences about email spam. Does it have a pattern? How do you take care of it?

Gandhi- A Social Engineering Genius

noreply@blogger.com (Chetan Pinto) — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 06:37:00 +0000

Winston Churchill called him the ‘naked fakir of India’. The Nobel committee failed to honour the man with the Nobel Peace Prize. (I’m relieved they didn’t change their mind later, though!). Gandhi was the runner up to the Time Person of The Century, an honour bestowed on Albert Einstein. And it was Einstein who remarked- generations from now, people would find it hard to believe that a man like Gandhi actually walked on earth in flesh and blood.

People often underestimate the impact Gandhi has had on some of the major world events and its leaders. Gandhi’s influence becomes apparent on leaders like Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and his fight for civil rights or Nelson Mandela’s twenty seven year relentless struggle against Apartheid from his prison or even Steve Jobs who was so taken by the Mahatma’s ‘simple living, high thinking’ credo that not only did he have a picture of Gandhi in his room, but led a surprisingly simple life despite the billions he was worth.

Newspapers, especially The Guardian, The New York Times and The Hindu, known for their ground breaking journalism on various world events stand a testament to Gandhi’s impact on contemporary society.

Here is Ruchira Gupta’s take on Gandhi in The Guardian:

……India gained independence without a war, something even the United States can't claim. This was largely due to Gandhi's understanding that the ends don't justify the means, the means are the ends; the means we choose, dictate the ends we get. As this has come down to us, it is popularly understood as non-violence, but it went far deeper than that. After all, if actions are only against something, however unjust, the result will not satisfy people's need to see and taste and live and work for something that is just. Even if the negative effort wins, a new negative will replace it because a critical mass of people haven't learned to live in a positive way. Gandhi went so far as to say that civil disobedience is "worse than useless…without …constructive effort."

(Gandhi immediately called off the Civil Disobedience movement declaring that India wasn’t ready for a mass non-violent movement after a mob attacked a police station and set it on fire at Chauri Chaura in 1922 in the state of Uttar Pradesh)

Gandhi matched each populist call for a negative action with a call for a positive action. It was what he called "constructive programming." For example, his call for non-violence included a call for a populist effort to help the wounded British soldiers in the Boer War (despite bitter opposition to the British rule in India). His argument for the eradication of "untouchables" – people outside the caste system whom Gandhi renamed Harijan or Children of God – included a call for caste Hindus to clean sewage in Harijan colonies; a reversal of their positions and jobs. His rejection of goods whose raw materials were grown in India, then shipped to British factories and sold back to Indians at a high price, was also a call to support village artisans by buying their goods instead.

Millions of volunteers were given something tangible to do. Rich and poor, women and men, entitled and disenfranchised; all joined in. Coming to know each other and challenging their customary beliefs about each other changed them. Young high-caste men worked in Harijan settlements, housewives spun yarn or threw their foreign made possessions into bonfires, men and women supported wounded soldiers, aristocrats gave up their inherited titles and become known for their personal actions, and factory owners donated funds and personal services to schools and ashrams. These actions changed not just the poor, but also the powerful.

For India, constructive programming became a political tool against the British Empire. Helping wounded and traumatized soldiers meant highlighting the brutality of war, serving a Harijan colony meant challenging the hierarchy of caste. They created the daily experience of democracy from the bottom up.

Positive acts are contagious. They balance the negative protests that are vital, too, they teach us how to live, and they show us what a just government could do. …What he called his "experiments with truth" were positive acts in the ordinary spaces of our daily lives……

Read the complete article in The Guardian here

Gandhi remains a positive moral compass for humanity. He is perhaps the greatest social engineering genius the world has ever seen. With just a loin cloth, a walking stick, and an old fashioned idea called non-violence, he inspired the Indian nation to unite, despite the ugly caste and gender differences, and empowered the people to resist the British lathis (batons) and bullets without the temptation to retaliate violently or surrender. That’s the power of great leadership something we all desperately need today.

Unfortunately, Gandhi has also become a victim of his own ideals. Instead of trying to debate his views openly we either dismiss them as impractical or choose to ‘respect’ him by putting him on a high pedestal or reducing him to a picture, a statue or a postage stamp.

But every now and then his ideas rise up like a phoenix, captivating people’s imagination and inspiring them to protest for peaceful change from movements right across New Delhi to New York from the Arab streets to Europe. Every now and then politicians, authoritarian dictators and heads of states are reminded that the means they choose, dictate the ends they get.

In fact, Gandhi and his views are a threat to any kind of leadership that chooses to ignore the legitimate demands of its people and decides to act with force.

His ideas are a threat even to ordinary people who deliberately try to manipulate the truth for short term gains.

Meredith Alexander: Why I resigned over Bhopal

noreply@blogger.com (Chetan Pinto) — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 06:09:00 +0000

In 2010, the International Olympic Committee appointed Dow as an international sponsor for the Games. This decision was taken in Geneva, and the commission had no ability to take a stand. Then last year, Locog, the London Games organiser, invited companies to tender for a major contract to provide a wrap for the main Olympic stadium. Dow won this bidding process. Many groups and individuals raised questions and finally the commission was asked to investigate.

I was shocked to see that the result of our investigation was a public statement from the commission that essentially portrays Dow a responsible company. I had been providing information about Bhopal to commission members and I was stunned that it publicly repeated Dow's line that it bears no responsibility for Bhopal.

I did everything I could to get the statement corrected or retracted. When it became apparent that this would not happen, I realised that the only way to ensure that my name was not used to justify Dow's position was to resign. And the only way to ensure that the victims' side of the story was told was to do so in public.

I have been deeply moved to realise how many people are interested in my choice and how much support there has been for my difficult decision. I would like to see Dow take responsibility for the Bhopal tragedy and finally ensure that real justice is achieved for the victims and the families of those who died. This would be a true Olympic legacy.

(Excerpts from Meredith’s article in The Guardian)

Read the full story on The Guardian

What Is Really Preventing Women’s Career Progress?

noreply@blogger.com (Chetan Pinto) — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 07:02:00 +0000

My mother works as a high school English teacher. She cooks and takes care of my father, and me and my brother, whenever we are around, packs lunch for us, takes our dog for a walk, tends to the garden ( 21 coconut trees, flower garden and a kitchen garden) all before she goes to school in the morning. She comes home and does this all over again apart from regular school work like essays, notes and answer scripts which she brings home to check.

At least twice a week she walks to the market which is a kilometre away to buy fish and other home related shopping. She has no time for T.V although she sometimes sits with us. She is also pretty active in the local community and because she is popular as a teacher, every other weekend she is invited to speak at a community event.

Most people would think of all this as an achievement. But not my Mom. In fact despite all the praise she gets for her work, I have not come across a woman more unsure and self-critical of her abilities!

Virginia M. Rometty, I.B.M.'s first female chief executive, was earlier offered a big job, but she felt she did not have enough experience. So she told the recruiter she needed time to think about it.

That night, her husband asked her, ‘Do you think a man would have ever answered that question that way?’

"What it taught me was you have to be very confident, even though you're so self-critical inside about what it is you may or may not know," -reports the New York Times which incidentally is also headed by a woman.

Jodi Glickman offers an interesting explanation in the Harvard Business Review blog:

If the first female CEO of Big Blue thinks she's under-qualified, one wonders how the rest of women are stacking up on the self-confidence and self-promotion scales? Here's where I think women get it wrong: we are perpetually rounding down, where, by all rules of mathematics, we should be rounding up. And that slight miscalculation has huge repercussions in our professional lives……

A female CEO of a commodities trading firm once told me every time she posted a job opening requiring eight qualifications for a candidate, she would have a trove of men banging down her door demanding the job or promotion. They would invariably tell her they were the absolute right person for the job while actually only having four, maybe five of the qualifications listed. She'd then notice that no senior women approached her about the job. So she would reach out instead, and time and time again, the women would respond, "I wanted to apply, but I only have six of the qualifications, so I'm not the right person." The men rounded up, often lobbying for the job when they had a mere 50% of the stated qualifications (not even 51%!) while the women with 75% of the skills needed, took themselves out of the running……..

In the corporate boardrooms women face a different but a familiar problem, tokenism or under-representation For example, having a woman CEO surrounded by males! I believe it is irresponsible to represent women in such a way that they are shot down more than they are heard.

Representation for women is not a question of equality or merit or fairness as much as it is about diversity. Diversity is about balancing testosterone with a more cautious approach. It is about Emotional Intelligence as much as business intelligence. It is also about ensuring that mistakes happen less often simply by exposing company decisions to more points of view before implementation.

Having said this, I do not see top-down policy level changes favouring gender diversity on boards unless of course there is undeniable statistical proof of improvement and since companies are painfully slow in implementing such initiatives, there in no way of knowing the benefits of better women representation without shareholder activism.

In other words, women face an inner struggle of confidence just as they fight for their rightful place in the outside world all at the same time! They need to reconcile both to get ahead without losing their natural advantage of Emotional Intelligence in the process. That’s not easy.

No wonder so few of them make it to the top!

How To Avoid Google’s Personalised Search without using Bing?

noreply@blogger.com (Chetan Pinto) — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 09:35:00 +0000

I know a lot of you are irritated with Google’s new personalised search feature and Google+ integration. If you are signed in to Google, you get personalised Google+ junk on top. If you do not sign in you only get 10 results and with Google+ junk showing on top, the actual results are now available only on page 2 or 3. This makes Google + a big minus for user experience in reality! I had predicted this in my earlier post- You’re on Google+ even before signing up! So, should you start looking at Bing seriously? Not so fast.

Bing is already pre-censored results in most cases which means you have a better chance of getting far superior search results on page 2 or 3 of Google than on Bing’s default page. Instead, consider trying a mix of the following alternatives:

Scroogle: If you are looking for search results without Google’s ads or other bells and whistles you should consider Scroogle. It’s a cleaner, lighter version of Google results and will remind you of what Google used to be say, five years back. Scroogle is not a search engine but a browser plug-in which means going to the Scroogle homepage will only give you instructions on how to integrate Scroogle with your browser. These instructions allow you to make Scroogle your default search engine on any browser be it Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome (Yes, I use Scroogle as default search engine on Google’s own browser) or Opera. I must confess, that ever since I’ve known Scroogle I have not bothered searching on Google much. Here is why Scroogle is far better than Google

Scroogle gives you 100 results by default without asking you to sign in.
There’s no personalised search crap from Google +
It’s very fast and secure because unlike Google, it does not insert cookies that track your search actions.

Go to Scroogle.org

Wikipedia Search: If you are researching a project or writing an article, chances are you’ll find the best, up-to-date information on Wikipedia. Wikipedia results appear on the top of Google search results so frequently that some people actually describe Google as Wikipedia search. Since a single Wikipedia article contains enough relevant external links to satisfy your curiosity you may not require doing a Google search on the same topic once again.

All browsers come with Wikipedia search as one of the options:

Look on the top right panel of your browser and select Wikipedia from the various search options provided.
Enter your search term in search bar and you have your Wikipedia search results.
You do not have to go to the Wikipedia homepage to search for information if you use the browser option.

I’m pretty confident that Scroogle and Wikipedia will give you better quality results and you may not actually have to migrate to Bing!

Increasing employee engagement through the 80-20 principle

noreply@blogger.com (Chetan Pinto) — Sun, 08 Jan 2012 08:24:00 +0000

During the Libyan uprising, even the Tripoli Zoo was not spared. Out of the 175 employees, only 12 stayed back. When asked why they didn’t run away, some of them said there would be nobody else to look after the animals. ‘Humans can fend for themselves, where would the animals go?’- some said. Some others said that these animals were a national treasure and they decided to stay because of a sense of national duty. It’s extraordinary that the employees who stayed back comprised roughly 20% of the total number of employees.

Similarly, the expatriates who stayed back during the uprising, yours truly included, was roughly equal to about 20% of the overall workforce.

You might have noticed that most of the so called ‘unimportant work’ is done by a small number of people. These people are happy to stay back, willing to work extra without additional pay and do not seem to be too motivated by promotions as much as by doing the job itself.

Some of us may call them dumb and stupid. Nevertheless, these people are simply very passionate about what they do. The rest of us ‘smart people’ comprise 80% of the people.

That does not mean ‘smart people’ just like to cut corners! It’s just that the work environment doesn’t provide enough motivation for most of these employees to be passionately engaged at work. It could be because of a lack of flexibility with the number of working hours or because of undue stress put on them by way of deadlines or targets.

That said, there seems to be no convincing explanation for this 80/20 phenomenon. But it’s such a recurrent pattern that Google decided to devote 20% of the time for employees to pursue their pet projects. This way the 80% of the ‘smart people’ would remain engaged doing things they considered relevant and exciting. As a result Google saw a massive productivity increase and is today counted among the world’s most innovative companies.

So the questions that need to be asked are,

Do you know the 20% of the most dedicated staff and duly recognize them instead of simply taking their dedication for granted?
Do you have policies to engage the 80% of the smart people who always complain they work for a terrible boss but are also very talented?

If you as a team leader or boss are clueless about these questions, do something about it before your employees do! Remember, whether the employees are working passionately or not, you still need to pay their salaries. Firing under- performing employees may look like a good idea but it creates fear and a hostile environment for employees who will shy away from taking risks just to save their jobs.

So, why not spend some more money using the 80/20 principle as an index and create conditions where the employees can truly enjoy their work, love and admire their boss and be proud of their company?

Encouraging Random Acts of Kindness

noreply@blogger.com (Chetan Pinto) — Mon, 02 Jan 2012 07:04:00 +0000

Do you recall a situation when someone did you a good deed that you still remember and tell others? My guess is that you remember them because the person would have been an absolute stranger and would have helped you out of pure kindness without expecting anything in return. Such Random Acts of Kindness make us all feel good. They make us realize the importance of our common humanity. We would love more of them and I’m sure we are more than willing to reciprocate. Even so, gestures of kindness are rare. Maybe, in our stressful, fast-paced life, our minds have been so preoccupied with ‘more important things’ that we have allowed ‘things’ to define our happiness. Maybe there’s more to life than success and ambition. Maybe life need not be this stressful. Maybe we should stop worrying so much about how something or someone will benefit us even before we decide to help them and just do it simply to relieve stress!

The following extract from the book Delivering Happiness may help explain the idea behind Random Acts of Kindness:

Towards the end of my trip in a foreign country I had no money left except for a handful of foreign coins at the bottom of my handbag. Thirsty, I grabbed a soda from the snack bar at the airport and read the sign: FOREIGN MONEY ACCEPTED. But I had almost downed the whole can when I spotted another sign: NO FOREIGN COINS. PAPER CURRENCY ONLY. My attempt to convince the cashier to take all my coins was futile. Suddenly, the gentleman behind me reached over and paid for my soda. I thanked him and tried giving him all my coins but he refused. He just asked that I start doing random acts of kindness for others. That one incident with a stranger in the airport stayed with me forever.

Back in my country I just finished checking off my long shopping list at a supermarket and stepped up to the counter. Two people who only had a few items got in line behind me so naturally I let them go first. When it was my turn, the cashier was about a third of the way through my items when an older gentleman filed in line. Two cans of peanuts were in his hands.

I turned to him and asked him to give them to me. With a puzzled look on his face, he asked why. It’s a random act of kindness, I said. The cashier scanned and placed the items in a bag and handed it to the gentleman. Then he looked at me and said, “Tell me about this ‘random act of kindness’. He listened to my story about the stranger in London, profusely thanked me, and left the store. Now it was the cashier’s turn to look at me strangely. He too wanted to know about “random acts of kindness” and I explained.

Leaving that store, I had an incredible feeling. Not only did I share kindness, I shared it with two people and could only hope they might pay it forward as well someday.

A few days later, on my way home from work after my night shift, I walked in to the same supermarket at 7:00 AM. I had barely stepped foot into the store when I heard, “Hi Martha. It was the same cashier from the other day. Surprised, I said, “I can’t believe you remember my name.” He replied, “I wrote your name down from the credit card receipt, because I didn’t want to forget the person that taught me about ‘random acts of kindness.’ I’ve told others about it too!” The funny thing was, he was the one now returning the kindness through a simple gesture of remembering my name!!

Random acts of kindness are more about empathy and as such could be more effective than philanthropy or charity. There is no obvious benefit of fame or publicity. Acts of kindness need not be reserved for the special people in our lives. Everyone can be special, everything can be special. If you ever have fallen in love, you know what I mean! The world need not just look beautiful during some special moments. It can happen more often!

I’ll give you two examples of organizations that practice random acts of kindness as a matter of policy. Many of you might have heard of Vipassana. A 10 day Vipassana meditation course is free for anyone, complete with food and lodging. At the end of the course you could choose to make a donation provided you feel you have benefitted from the course and would like other people to benefit from the course. The foundation does not accept donations from corporations or from anyone who has not attended the Vipassana course. It’s founder refuses to be addressed as ‘Guru’ or ‘Sri Sri Sri’ or ‘Pope’ or ‘Bishop’ or any other title of veneration but merely as Mr. S.N. Goenka.

Wikipedia, the famous online encyclopedia is the result of a worldwide volunteer effort without any commercial intention. Jimmy Wales, Wikipedia’s founder says- We just know ads are not an appropriate thing to find in a project devoted to education and knowledge - and especially one that strives for balance and neutrality. It gets all of its annual funding from a short campaign run on its own site. The ad is pretty powerful and can easily make one feel guilty especially for those of us who do not contribute either with cash or time. Therefore, Wikipedia allows us to remove the ad as well. You see, Jimmy Wales does not want us to contribute out of force or guilt. He just hopes that we will come around to see his point some day!

People and companies guided by high moral and ethical standards may be rare, but they do exist and they do make a big impact on people’s lives. And for that very reason, such organizations will find people to support the cause and to make an even bigger impact!

Wouldn’t the world be a much better place with more random acts of kindness? I think every single act of kindness done without expectation of a return has the potential to be infectious. Because the act of kindness is random, it has the power to inspire other people. Some people may refuse to accept the kindness and/or promise to return the favour in future! Simply reassure them with a smile and ask them to return the favour to other people.

Why not try doing a random act of kindness, make it infectious and start a silent revolution?

Of course, there is no way of finding out whether the beneficiary will return the favour to others. But that’s not the objective. The purpose is to feel inspired and to inspire others to do so.

So the next time you are frustrated in traffic as other people are trying to overtake you or when you are queuing at the super market billing counter, think about ‘random acts of kindness’. In such situations just a smile can be a powerful sign of kindness. There is no stress, no commitment, no force to do so though. The act is purely voluntary.

Those who act will reap the rewards of satisfaction, fulfillment and happiness. Strangely though it may even relieve stress and bring down blood pressure! The more one acts out of kindness, the more one is rewarded in return. And one day it may just occur to us- that life is truly beautiful!

How To Make Your PC Run Fast, Virus-free and Secure only with FREE software

noreply@blogger.com (Chetan Pinto) — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 08:55:00 +0000

Computer maintenance isn't exactly something that most people remember to do. When a computer doesn't work, most people call for professional help or ask family members or friends to help fix their slow computer.Well, this short and easy five-step guide will teach you to maintain your computer problem-free for as long as you wish with a range of powerful but free programs, without depending on others for help!

Let's begin:

1. Use CCleaner to Clean Your System’s Junk

CCleaner removes unused files from your system allowing Windows to run faster and freeing up valuable hard disk space. It also cleans traces of your online activities such as your Internet history and other embarrassing stuff you were watching online.

Download Ccleaner here

Operating Instructions:

After installation, click on the desktop icon to run the program. Look for the brush icon that says Cleaner. Press it once and then click analyse. After analysis click run cleaner.
Now look for the cube icon that says Registry. Press it once and then click analyse. After analysis click run cleaner. Do not be afraid. The software knows what it is doing.
Advanced users can check out the other powerful features as well.
You can install CCleaner Portable on your USB and clean your friends computer as well.

Download CCleaner Portable here

2. Defragment Your Hard Disk Using Defraggler

Most defrag tools only allow you to defrag an entire drive. Defraggler lets you specify one or more files, folders, or the whole drive to defragment. Defraggler rearranges your scattered files into order and helps Windows run faster.

Download Defraggler here

Operating Instructions:

· After installation, click on the desktop icon to run the program. You will find all the drives separately listed. Click on any one. Click the analyse button below. After analysis, click defragment.

3. Get Rid of Malware Using Malwarebytes’ Anti-Malware

Only the most sophisticated anti-malware techniques can detect and remove malicious programs from your computer. Malwarebytes Anti-Malware Free utilizes powerful technology to detect and remove all traces of malware including worms, trojans, rootkits, rogues, dialers, spyware and more with lightning fast rapid scanning. Use this program to scan USB as soon as you insert it into your computer. Use it to complement the security offered by your anti-virus. Updates are available for the free version too.

Download Malwarebytes Anti-Malware Free here

Operating Instructions:

After installation, click on the desktop icon to run the program. First connect to the internet and install the latest malware updates. Then select the drives to scan.
You can select any file or USB stick to scan for malware.

Note:

This program can run and complement your existing anti-virus without any problems as this is not technically an anti-virus program.
The free version does not proactively prevent malware or virus attacks. Do not worry. The anti-virus I have mentioned below will more than do that job.
This program is a great additional layer of protection, just in case.

4. Use a new, faster browser instead of Internet Explorer

The main source of trouble for your system is the Internet Explorer (IE) browser that comes along with Windows. Moreover many web services like Google, Gmail etc. do not support IE version 6 or even 7. It’s better to use a faster, feature-rich and secure browser. Here are the best ones categorised according to speed-

· Opera- Download Link

(Comes with a Turbo mode that speeds up slow internet connections by upto five times! I use it myself and recommend it!)

· Firefox- Download Link

(Great feature-rich alternative to Internet Explorer. Try out the wide range of free plugins and extensions available.)

· Google Chrome- Download Link

(Beware! Chrome silently updates the browser without your permission. Go to Control Panel>Scheduled Tasks and delete the entries related to Google Chrome updates if you too are irritated like me!)

If you wish to use Internet Explorer, please update it to IE 8 for Windows XP and IE 9 for Windows Vista and 7 for your own online security. I find all the above mentioned browsers faster than Internet Explorer. Microsoft apparently doesn’t believe in supporting IE 9 for old-fashioned Windows XP users like me, but Opera, Firefox and Google Chrome, much more feature-rich and sophisticated browsers, happily do.

5. Use a free but feature-rich anti-virus like Avast

People are very reluctant to change their anti-virus. Read the latest anti-virus comparison reports from the most trusted source at av-comparatives.org.

Download Avast here

Two anti-virus programs cannot run together. If you have an antivirus already installed on your computer, please remove it first before installing Avast. Antivirus programs can be pretty stubborn and may refuse to go away even after being uninstalled. If you experience a problem, type the name of the old anti-virus you need to remove and search online for a removal tool (a tiny program that can completely uninstall the old anti-virus) as shown below on google-

(Antivirus name) removal tool

For eg. If your old anti-virus name is Kaspersky, do a Google search for-

Kaspersky Removal Tool

Run the program after you download and your previous anti-viruswill be completely removed. Now you are ready to install Avast.

Here is the something you need to do to get Avast Free-

After 30 days you need to register online to get your free license key
Your free license key is sent by email within 24 hours after registration
Enter the license key into the program and continue using the program with free updates for a whole year. Get the free online registration link-

Avast Free Online Registration Link

You can always use a paid anti-virus. But if you’re a normal user like me, you can stick with the free version.
Avast Free will auto-update by default every time you log on to the Internet.

Other equally good anti-virus products with similar features that I can recommend are-

Avira Free-Antivirus (requires at least Windows XP Sp 3. Click on Ccleaner to find out if you do not know). Windows Vista and 7 users need not worry.

Microsoft Security Essentials- If you are sure you own a genuine licensed Windows Operating System, you can try this.

Just remember, two anti-virus programs cannot run together .

Some of the listed programs offer professional or premium versions for a price. I have tried them myself. However I feel the paid versions just provide some additional fancy features and are mostly an attempt to recoup the cost of the free versions. Feel free to buy the paid version. But it’s not necessary or recommended.

For best results, install all the five recommended programs and use them at least once a week to experience the real benefits of a fast, virus-free PC performance.
I’ve been personally using all the above programs for years without any problem.
Try it out and share your views.

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