Runner-Friendly Headphones

via From Where I Sit:

Michael Hyatt has some great recommendations for runner-friendly headphones on his blog, From Where I Sit.

Chart Pattern Fills in Excel 2007

via DailyDoseOfExcel.com:

I've heard several people complain about the fact that the chart pattern fills are not available in Excel 2007. This feature can be useful if you print charts on a non-color printer. Although charts created with previous versions of Excel continue to display the pattern fills, there is no way to apply patterns fills using the Excel 2007 UI.

Microsoft's Eric Patterson addressed this problem by creating an add-in. You can download it here: Chart Pattern Fills.

This add-in creates a new group (Patterns) on the Chart Tools / Format tab. The group has one control that, when clicked, shows the available patterns to apply to the selected chart element.

Are Your Prepared for Holidy PC Repairs?

via ZDNet:

Ed Bott has a great article on ZDNet with some recommendations on how to prepare for the inevitable Holiday PC Repairs.

Nordstrom Opposes Christmas Creep

via Consumerist:



Nordstrom has conquered the urge to celebrate Christmas before Thanksgiving. The retailer announced its decision to respect the calendar and common sense by hanging signs declaring that they will wait until the day after Thanksgiving, the earliest acceptable moment, to display their Christmas decorations. The vainglorious announcement is an important indicator that Nordstrom's competitors have overdone the unseasonable cheerfulness schtick.

How to Maximize the Bang for the Buck When You Buy Organic Food

via GradMoneyMatters:

At the grocery store, I have noticed that organic food in general costs about 25 – 50% more than regular items, and in some cases the mark up is more than 200%. According to the USDA certification guidelines - “Organic meat, poultry, eggs, and dairy products come from animals that are given no antibiotics or growth hormones. Organic food is produced without using most conventional pesticides; fertilizers made with synthetic ingredients or sewage sludge; bioengineering; or ionizing radiation.” For some, especially those with young children, it may seem like the benefits of using organic foods justifies the extra cost. But like everything else, it is important to look beyond the label to get the best bang for the buck. Here is some information that can help decide which organic purchases are worth the extra cost and which may not be.

Security experts: NIST encryption standard may have NSA backdoor

via Ars Technica:

According to security experts, an algorithm for generating random numbers that is included in an official standard documented by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) could potentially include a backdoor planted by the NSA.

In a recent blog entry, cryptographer Bruce Schneier describes research that was presented by his colleagues Niels Ferguson and Dan Shumow at the CRYPTO 2007 conference this past August. The security researchers have raised concerns about a potential backdoor in the Dual_EC_DRBG algorithm, which is documented in NIST's 800-90 publication about deterministic random bit generators. Dual_EC_DRBG, which is based on elliptic curves, is said to be significantly slower to compute than the other algorithms in the standard and was supposedly only included at all because it has the strong support of the NSA.

Read the rest at Ars Technica

Tech Support - The HP Way

via Zoli's Blog:

Reading this gem (hat tip: Ben Casnocha) about the nightmare of trying to get HP support their PC’s reminded me of my own horror story. Actually, not horror - just comedy.

Anyway… yeah, I was weak, fell for the good deal at Costco, and got myself a Vista-loaded junk from HP. There’s one component that shines - literally: the display. 22 inches of shiny black beauty, sharp screen, it tilts and moves around in every imaginable way, even pivots for a vertical view. But there was a little glitch with pivoting: I had to lie down to read the screen. There was no way to get the screen image rotate - something that should happen automatically.

I’ll spare you the first 20 minutes or so of the online chat with HP support, let’ s just jump to where it got really interesting:

Support: You probably have a video card that does not support auto-pivoting.

Me: That’s not possible. I did not build this machine, it’s a standard HP system out-of-the-box.

Support: I don’t understand.

Stop. Take a deep breath. This is just hilarious. Rather than trying to find the answer, the easy way out is to claim a standard configuration HP is selling consists of a mismatched video card and monitor. She has absolutely no idea how she is damaging the brand. Oh, well, let’s get a supervisor … wait .. disconnect.

Btw, “disconnecting” appears to be a standard HP solution to support issues: I’m still waiting for this other fellow to “gather all information” to my email over a month ago. Perhaps he’ll figure it out by the time I dump this PC.

LinkedIn and the Future of Business Networking

via ReadWriteWeb:

In the heyday of the Facebook hype (it seems so long ago now!), Facebook was going to eat LinkedIn’s lunch. Based on recent experience, I don’t think so.

I recently had reason to use LinkedIn seriously, using my existing network to tap into a market that I had not previously been exposed to. I had not used LinkedIn since the early days, so this was my first serious update.

I have NOT used Facebook seriously. I registered out of curiosity about the phenomenon and found that the only network I could join was based on zip code - and that was useless. Then Read/WriteWeb set up a group on Facebook, but I looked once and left. When I want the Read/WriteWeb network, I go to the site itself. So please take my comments on Facebook with a large lump of salt; but Fred Wilson too has made a more determined effort to use Facebook and he has been disappointed. If there are technology entrepreneurs on Facebook, you would think they would respond to an ad from one of the leading VCs in the social media space saying “be my friend”.

Humor of the Day

via Ben Casnocha:

The New York Times Magazines revisits the first episodes of Sesame Street, the packaging of which warns that the shows "may not suit the needs of today's preschoolers." The writer discovers an abundance of "disturbing" content in early Sesame Street, such as one scene where "two brothers risk concussion while whaling on each other with allergenic feather pillows."

3 Reasons Your Business is Growing Slowly

via Freelance Folder:

Reason #1: You’re Fishing For Customers, Instead Of Going To The Fish Market.

Reason #2: You’re Using People Nobody Knows As Your References

Reason #3: You’re Not Charging Enough (And Justifying Why You’re Worth It)

Write Well, Get Rich

Hedge fund manager Mark Sellers recently told some Harvard business students the secrets to success as an investor - here's a clip:

As an investor, you need to perform calculations and have a logical investment thesis. This is your left brain working. But you also need to be able to do things such as judging a management team from subtle cues they give off. You need to be able to step back and take a big picture view of certain situations rather than analyzing them to death. You need to have a sense of humor and humility and common sense. And most important, I believe you need to be a good writer. Look at Buffett; he's one of the best writers ever in the business world. It's not a coincidence that he's also one of the best investors of all time. If you can't write clearly, it is my opinion that you don't think very clearly.

Don't Break The Chain

via LifeHacker

This post was great timing for me, considering NaNoWriMo just started yesterday!

Years ago when Seinfeld was a new television show, Jerry Seinfeld was still a touring comic. At the time, I was hanging around clubs doing open mic nights and trying to learn the ropes. One night I was in the club where Seinfeld was working, and before he went on stage, I saw my chance. I had to ask Seinfeld if he had any tips for a young comic. What he told me was something that would benefit me a lifetime...

He said the way to be a better comic was to create better jokes and the way to create better jokes was to write every day. But his advice was better than that. He had a gem of a leverage technique he used on himself and you can use it to motivate yourself—even when you don't feel like it.

He revealed a unique calendar system he uses to pressure himself to write. Here's how it works.

He told me to get a big wall calendar that has a whole year on one page and hang it on a prominent wall. The next step was to get a big red magic marker.

He said for each day that I do my task of writing, I get to put a big red X over that day. "After a few days you'll have a chain. Just keep at it and the chain will grow longer every day. You'll like seeing that chain, especially when you get a few weeks under your belt. Your only job next is to not break the chain."

"Don't break the chain," he said again for emphasis.

Over the years I've used his technique in many different areas. I've used it for exercise, to learn programming, to learn network administration, to build successful websites and build successful businesses.

It works because it isn't the one-shot pushes that get us where we want to go, it is the consistent daily action that builds extraordinary outcomes. You may have heard "inch by inch anything's a cinch." Inch by inch does work if you can move an inch every day.

Daily action builds habits. It gives you practice and will make you an expert in a short time. If you don't break the chain, you'll start to spot opportunities you otherwise wouldn't. Small improvements accumulate into large improvements rapidly because daily action provides "compounding interest."

Skipping one day makes it easier to skip the next.

I've often said I'd rather have someone who will take action—even if small—every day as opposed to someone who swings hard once or twice a week. Seinfeld understands that daily action yields greater benefits than sitting down and trying to knock out 1000 jokes in one day.

Think for a moment about what action would make the most profound impact on your life if you worked it every day. That is the action I recommend you put on your Seinfeld calendar. Start today and earn your big red X. And from here on out...

Don't break the chain!

4 Strategies To Help You Live Debt Free

via Consumerist.com

SmartMoney.com has a great article about four simple principles that you can remember which will help you to live debt free.

"Change the monthly mind set"
No more "low monthly payments" for you. This means their answer to is to apply it all to a high-interest credit card account, for example. The sooner you pay these sorts of loans off, the more you'll save. If you pay 1/12th more each month on your home loan—the equivalent of one extra payment a year—you can shave 7 years off a 30 year mortgage.

"Fix it and forget it"
Get out of your ARM loan as soon as you can, and if you have good credit, look for the elusive fixed-rate credit card. SmartMoney suggests you check out CardRatings.com.

"Shuffle the cards"
Take advantage of zero-interest transfer offers from credit cards, not so you can run up the card with new charges, but so you can pay off your debt faster—which can lead to a better credit score, which makes you a more attractive customer to credit card companies, which means you can shop for better offers and lower rates.

"All under one roof"
Consolidate your loans into one payment at a lower rate, usually through a home equity loan if you can get one.