CategoryGeneral Tech

SBTUG Web Content Management System Smackdown Presentations (UPDATED)

Here’s the presentations from our annual SBTUG smackdown event held tonight. Most of the presenters have sent me their presentations, only a few left to add. I wanted to say a big thank you to Nick Ellery (@nickellery) from Microsoft for looking after us on the night. Not only did Microsoft supply the venue (which they do every month) and free parking, but they also sponsored the night and...

Microsoft – Privacy versus Profits

Good leaders make tough decisions. They may not always be the right decisions, and usually not everyone likes those decisions, but they have to be made. Ed Bott’s post – Good Microsoft versus Bad Microsoft – highlighted this interesting piece from the Wall Street Journal. It’s about how Microsoft decided to kill off some of the planned privacy bits (in particular what was enabled by...

Appalling customer service – Woodstone

Here's an email our Sys Admin received in reply to a query to a vendor whose product wasn't working on our servers…

It made our decision to select a new vendor pretty easy.
Technorati Tags: Customer service

VS2008 Hot fix available

Scott Guthrie has noted the hot fix fixes… Note, it is a huge download – coming in at a whopping 2.6 MB :-) See, it's not that hard to get fixes out. I said yesterday that I was impressed with how intent on producing high quality software Microsoft has been of late. This is yet another example. I need to be careful or I'll start getting labelled a fanboy. Technorati Tags:...

100 Tips to Defeat Content Thieves

The always excellent, helpful and well researched Virtual Hosting Blog has another ripper with this post on Tips to Defeat Content Thieves.
Technorati Tags: Content, Protection

Google advertising continues to boggle my mind

Even though their ad share slipped ever so slightly in quarter 4 last year, they still pulled in over $25B. I can't believe people click on so many ads. I mean, who is actually clicking on these damn things? I noted before that I don't even see the ads, but it seems many do. I'm so stunned by this that you may have noticed I've started experimenting with AdSense on my various...

Redfin and Real Estate

I've always thought Real Estate agents are more of a hindrance than a help, and wondered why on earth we need them? There's plenty of problems with the whole 'I'll sell your house for you, charge you, but maybe not work in your best interest if it suits me to just sell it to someone so I can get my commission' business model.After all, it is easy to find properties on the web...

Amazon buys Audible

Michele and I love Audible. We buys stacks of audio books from them. The interface is intuitive, they have good bargains, and if you are clever (like my wife is) you can time your purchases for maximum buying power (look into how they do their credit system – trust me, you can save a lot).So, I'm pleased on one hand to hear that they have been bought by Amazon (another of my favourite...

User group suggestions

Chris Williams has 21 thoughts on running a user group. All good ideas, but 10 and 12 struck home with me. One thing we need to realise is that sometimes people can't make it and you'll have a very small group – don't take it personally (as I usually do and get all concerned). More importantly (point 12) respect the time of your members. Don't overdo it, and make sure you...

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