Category Archives: technology

Playing with Camtasia

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Okay, I just got a lot more dangerous.

I have been playing with Camtasia to edit my videos… here’s the first edited video I’ve done (I’ll post this on JibberJobber next week):

Is that cool or what?

Well yeah, of course the content is cool… but here’s what I did with the built-in editor Camtasia provides:

  1. Added an arrow to show you were to look,
  2. Zoomed in and out a couple of times,
  3. Added a “note” at the end…
  4. Added a watermark (see bottom right)

I almost cut out some audio but I am not ready for that massive step in editing yet.  I’ll get there.

I also need to figure out why this is not BIGGER… I know where the setting is to save it as a big video, but I must have clicked the wrong button…

Anyway, cool stuff, huh?

 

Are You Blogging Effectively?

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This morning I have written four blog posts, on four different blogs.  Well, with this one, make that FIVE.

Why do I do it?

Because blogging continues to be an incredibly effective tool for outreach, community development, sharing my thoughts, personal therapy, and even SEO.  It helps me stay connected, and it makes me think critically about my ideas.

Here’s what I’ve written just this morning:

Another Way to See Full Names on LinkedIn: Recommendations. On my LinkedIn blog. Had to schedule this for tomorrow since a prescheduled post went up this morning.

Finding Dignity, Finding Hope. Identifying Your Identity. On my JibberJobber blog. Perhaps the most important post I’ve written this month, maybe this year, about how job seekers tend to lose their identity, and how that is not good (and what to do/think about it).

What is the scariest thing about starting (or thinking about starting) a business? On my 51 Alternatives blog (this is for my newest book).  This was a soft-pitch post, easy to write. Basically I let those blog readers know about my LinkedIn question, which is totally relevant for this audience.

How has social marketing evolved? Please share your thoughts… On the Recruiting Blogs community. I posted this on a Group Discussion on LinkedIn, but thought that community would be a great place to have a conversation about it.

And now this post, which is a good teaching post about blogging (how, when, how often, why, what to write, etc.).

Are YOU blogging effectively? Do you know WHY you are blogging?

Gmail and “Googlemail” scammers….

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Be careful what you click on!  It’s easy to “trust,” but please be cautious.

I put arrows at every obvious red-flag in this very short message.

Google would never send an email like this… you can tell it’s fake and fraudulent by any of the many mistakes below:

Note most of the red-flags are in the actual FROM email address.

If you mouse over the link, it takes you to a horrible URL that is clearly not from Google… another huge red flag.

 

UGH! When will Google Chrome work with Google Docs??

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This has been frustrating for weeks. I tried to work with it, but finally had to switch to Firefox just for this one thing I do.

I use Google Docs quite a bit.  One on of my spreadsheets when I click a cell, I can’t really tell where I am putting data.  The red arrow shows where I have my mouse when I click, and you can see the row that I’m putting it in… I think (is it 108 or 109??).  BUT, check out the blue line around the actual cell I’m putting the data in.

What the heck?  I have to open Firefox, cussing Chrome and/or Google Docs, wondering when the brilliant brains at Google are going to get Chrome/Docs working together.

OOPS! Leave a comment on the blog, but we make it impossible!

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I just read an interesting blog post, and decided to leave a comment.

My comment was really good (yes, I’m biased).  It was highly relevant, and helpful to the blogger as well as to her readers.

When I hit submit, I was prompted to login to (a) wordpress, or (b) gravatar.

I don’t have a wordpress account that I use, so I tried to login with my gravatar account.  I haven’t done this for, oh, years.  Since I set up the account.

I got an error message, prompting me to try again.

But here’s the sad truth: by this time, I was done.  I had lost interest in making this work.  Even thought the comment was good, and would have helped increase the credibility of the blog and blogger, I was done.  I closed the tab, moved on to the 50 other things I try and do before my workday starts.

Would the blogger have wanted and appreciated the comment?  I’m sure.  Bloggers want comments like addicts want ________.  It helps validate them as a blogger.

But the blogger made it too hard for me to leave a comment.

If you have a blog, logout and try and comment on one of your posts.  If it is not stupid-easy (that is, fill in the comment, your name, email addy and your URL, and that’s it!!), then you are making it too hard.

Behind the scenes on the LinkedIn iPad Application

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I just finished an awesome article about how the iPad app was developed for LinkedIn.  This was particular intriguing to me because we’re continually asked about a smartphone app for JibberJobber (go to m.JibberJobber.com to get to the mobile interface).

What I’ve said is that we’re collecting feedback, and as we get that we’ll get closer to deciding whether we need to do native smartphone apps.  Personally, I don’t want to do it.

Even if we were a huge company, creating and maintaining (and maintaining some more) native apps for the iPhone, Android, etc., and all of their whimsical changes (these are operating systems, so any core changes they make can be cause for a complete redesign/recoding of a native app).

In the article, it says that most of the iPad app is actually web-driven.  In other words, as far as I understand, it’s not an offline app… it has a few things that are native to the device, but pulls most of the data from the web.

Technology is a beautiful thing, and as a former developer, if this is the direction we’re headed (away from native apps and towards web-apps that look/feel/function like they are native), we’re headed in an awesome direction.

One can only hope!

Note: I have an iPad… but haven’t even cared to get the iPad app for LinkedIn.  I don’t do LinkedIn anywhere but from my PC.  How old-fashioned is that!

 

Winners, Losers, Acquisitions

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I’m really interested in user interface design.  I have no training in it, however, as the owner of JibberJobber I try to get people to become more engaged in the tool.  UI has everything to do with it.

Here’s a fun article on TechCrunch titled User Experience And The Poison On The Tip Of The Arrow.

Here’s a quote from the CEO of Wesabe, on a difference between Wesabe and Mint:

“I was focused on trying to make the usability of editing data as easy and functional as it could be; Mint was focused on making it so you never had to do that at all.”

The entire post (it’s short) is worth reading, but since I’ve read this line I can’t get it out of my mind.

How do YOU make your product/service (or yourself, if you are in job search mode) so simple and easy?  Wesabe was going towards simple and easy at the same time that Mint was redefining it.  And they redefined it to the tune of an acquisition of about $170M.

Social Media instead of Living Life

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Social media is… funny.

I wrote two books on social media. I train people how to use (mostly) LinkedIn. I talk about how job seekers can use these tools, and I talk a lot about personal branding, whether it is online or offline.

I’ve been on these tools for years. I’ve had heavy-use periods, and light-use periods (right now I’m going through a light-use phase).

I’ve seen people become consumed with social media, whether they think it is going to be the silver bullet to end their job search, or get them gobs of new customers, or just find a friend or share stuff… social media has become too-consuming.

Here’s a clip I found on TechCrunch where a comedian who has made over $.5M in one test/campaign using social media shares his thoughts on how we use it.

Some of my favorite parts:

Um, I don’t have any favorite parts.  The entire thing is a favorite.

So where does social media fit in? It’s a TOOL.

How can you use it as a tool, instead of YOU being the tool (see #4 here)??