The Refresh Orlando Heirs

Despite the steep drop of printer price, printer ink remains to be one of the most expensive liquids in the world. According to a recent study by the UK Consumers Association, printer ink costs even more than French Champagne per milliliter.

Many consumers are fed up with the high price of OEM replacement cartridges. Many of them bought a cheap ink printer for home use, only to find out that they have spent more on ink cartridges in just a few months. This is why discount ink cartridges become so popular among bargain hunting consumers these days.

Discount ink cartridges are mostly compatible cartridges, also known as generic cartridges. They are like the generic drugs in pharmaceutical industry. Compatible cartridges are made brand new with the same specifications of name brand cartridges but are generally 50-75% cheaper.

One consumer was quoted saying “I was amazed at the money I save using these discount ink cartridges. I can print as many color photos as I want now”. Another consumer said “I was a bit concerned about the printing quality at first, but it worked out great”.

The other type of discount ink cartridges is remanufactured cartridges. They are name brand cartridges which have gone through one cycle of use, but refilled and sometimes installed with new components. Remanufactured cartridges are a bit more expensive than compatible cartridges but still offer a big savings compared to OEM cartridges. In addition, they are very popular among environmentally concerned consumers.

Although many stores offer discount ink cartridges, consumers are advised to choose the products carefully. In addition to price comparison, they should seek out suppliers who can also provide good service, good refund policy and extended warranty.

To learn more about discount ink cartridges and to see if they are available for your printer model, please visit the following site:
http://inkjets.4reviews.net

Kwan H Lo is the owner of an online review site (inkjets.4reviews.net) which promotes high quality discount ink cartridge and toner cartridge.

How do you, or would you, communicate with employees who work offsite?

Perhaps you have telecommuters reporting to you, or sales reps who work out of offices in other cities. How do you communicate with them?

Let’s start with the strategic issues: what do you want to accomplish by communicating with them? And, why would they want to communicate with you?

Strategic means you’ll probably want to deal with issues like productivity, accountability, and predictability. You want to know what the offsite employee does, how she does it, and what she will do in the future.

Still in the strategic vein, you’ll ask yourself why she would want to communicate with you: some reasons might include the need to maintain human contact with the office, to get resources from you, or to work on her productivity.

To return to our sales reps example, you might want them target the certain prospects or to focus on high-margin products, From the other side, you might ask them about their needs and discover they need to know about product availability and a competitor’s new products.

Once you have a clear, articulated understanding of why you’re communicating, you can move to the tactical issues. Issues such as: how often, what issues to raise, and by what means.

Normally, you’ll find the tactical matters tend resolve themselves if you do a good job on strategy. That is, the answers to tactical questions tend to flow out of the decisions made in setting up the strategy.

Using our offsite sales reps example, you might decide to send a group email once a week, and in it provide information the sales reps want. You’ll also add information that you want to convey to them, especially information about the benefits of targeting and margins.

In addition, you’ll also call each rep individually once a month to review his or her personal performance. In these calls, you’ll deal with their individual performance. You’ll also ask about their particular needs and wants, and try to satisfy those needs.

As well as developing strategies and tactics, you’ll also schedule some evaluations. Periodically, you’ll sit down and ask yourself how well the offsite people are targeting and what proportion of their sales come through high margin products.

If they’re doing well, you’ll stick to the course you set earlier. On the other hand, if performance doesn’t meet your standards, then you could look at increasing the number of contacts, and the duration of each contact. Maybe you need to bring everyone into the office once a quarter, while still maintaining your weekly group mailing and individual contacts monthly.

In summary, as the number of offsite employees and service providers increases, the pressure to develop plans to communicate with them will grow as well. To make the most of this communication, start with strategic issues that define why you want to be in contact with them, and why they would want to be in contact with you.

About the Author

Robert F. Abbott writes and publishes Abbott’s Communication Letter. Learn how you can use communication to help achieve your goals, by reading articles or subscribing to this ad-supported newsletter. An excellent resource for leaders and managers, at:
http://www.communication-newsletter.com

Speed reading is vital in today’s business and academic world, with the vast information that the internet offers, and the huge amounts of reading tasks an average manager or student faces, there is really no choice but to try and increase the intake of information.

In the last forty years there has a been an explosion of information, we are living the information revolution and that requires a lot of young professionals a great deal of effort in digesting this information and making good use of it.

Most of the people who attend speed reading courses and classes have some kind of problem, or believe they have some kind of problem, with their reading, here are a few of these potential problems.

Lack of concentration or partial/impaired concentration is an obvious problem for speed reading, the effects of the environment on ones reading rhythm and the general tendency of some people to be able of acceptable reading rate only in ideal situations. This problem is one of the basic speed reading problems and is usually dealt with in most courses.

Poor eye movement may cause some readers to shift their eyes to other directions and than go back to the book or paper to relocated the last point read. This problem also correlates with poor mechanical skills, which can be a real problem in speed reading.

Short attention span is a clear problem, almost everyone knows this problem, you start strong and begin to slow down as you read on. This kind of problem typically creates a situation of going back to re-read some lines over and over again, or a need to read the same sentence a couple of times for lack of understanding or loosing the line of thought altogether.

Reading by heart, when a person reads to himself (muttering the words or even reading out load) is an obvious problem since speed reading is much faster than talking, the reading out load inhibited the ability to read fast and also regulates a slow input of information into the cognitive.

Delayed reaction to information and material – This delay often comes from inattention, reading ahead or distraction. Desire to remember every word – This is loosely related to the tendency to re-read or slow down.

So what can you do to increase your reading skills? Do you really need to try speed reading you should you consider just eliminating some of these problems. The answer is most likely dependent of what you need, no matter what you problem is, you need to address the problem.

To try and read faster, here are a few tips that would get you going. Think of reading as a ‘pick and choose’ activity, where you can choose to read the words and phrases that are critical to comprehension, and skip over the connective tissue.

One major key in speed reading is filtering out all the words that has nothing to do with the subject and naturally, there a lot of them. All the connecting words, basically words that are there to connect one word with the other to make a sentence (TO make A sentence) the “and” “it’s” and “and’s” have got to go, just make yourself blind to them, go over these words and do not dwell on reading or noticing them.

Practicing time reading is also good, set up a timer and see how much you read in one minute, and in five minutes. Try and honestly estimate how much did you get from the text (make sure this is something you read for the first time), and try to beat yourself at this over and over again, until you start to feel that you have moved up one level. Experiment with different texts, and try to find books with text that has some questions about what you just read so you can apprise your understanding. Evaluate your situation every time you do this, reading faster sometimes mean that you will make more mistakes on understanding the subject, you should start making “mental notes” while reading so you will not fail answering the questions.

Train yourself to read more quickly by forced timing. If you are a runner, training for a race, you go out and run every day and you try to improve your time or your distance.

Set a timer and run a reading race every day for two to four weeks. You do not have to spend more than five minutes on this exercise. You may become frustrated, at first, by the fact that you cannot read as fast or remember as much as you would like.

Practice makes perfect, and this is the most basic thing you can do to increase your reading speed, in two weeks you should see some improvement, and you should work on the weaker aspects of your reading skills. This is the start of speed reading, and once you master the basics you will be on your way to becoming a speed reader.

Jonathan Mayheart has been writing speed reading tips and advice for internet sites in the last few years. Jonathan currently writes Speed Reading articles for the tips and advice website http://speedreading.zupatips.com/

After a long winter, this is the time of year to spruce up your environment with a good Spring Cleaning. It’s amazing what doing this can do for one’s state of mind.

Not only does a good spring cleaning seem to lift our spirits, it has actually been proven to preserve our home and office environment. Additionally, people tend to be more productive after a good cleaning.

Although the inclination is to want to be outside as soon as the great weather begins, by doing a good spring cleaning you are actually creating the feeling of spring inside your home and office. It is also a great way to get the entire family involved in doing something together. To do this though, it has to be viewed as a fun experience rather than drudgery.

If it is your office you are giving a good cleaning to you will find this to be a great team building opportunity. With the pressures all businesses experience day in and day out, doing something out of the ordinary will allow for a unique bonding opportunity that is sure to strengthen communication skills and team unity.

To make it enjoyable your attitude will set the tone. If you view the experience as fun, those around you are more likely to do the same. Something that is sure to help is to start from a place of gratitude. Yes, gratitude.

For The Home

Look around your home and realize you have a home to clean. What a gift this is. It doesn’t matter the size of your home. What matters is what your home gives you. It gives you a place to enjoy time with family and friends. It gives you shelter from the elements. It gives you a space to relax in. That is of course if you have created it to offer these things.

For the Office

Think about all the ups and downs your business has been through in the last few years. Ups and downs many businesses have not survived. And yet, you have. Get your team involved in the process of acknowledging what it took to get to the point you are at. It is amazing the positive impact this can have.

The Process

Before you begin, find some good music you can enjoy while you clean. It’s amazing what lively music can do for the spirit.

You will be most effective if you have all your cleaning materials available before you begin. Gather what you need ahead of time so that you don’t have to stop midstream to run to the store for a bottle of window cleaner or furniture polish. Also make sure you have plenty of garbage bags, storage boxes and anything else that will make your job easier.

Give yourself a break from the phones, especially if you are making this a family experience.

As you clean each room, organizing what you have, be willing to let go of what you no longer need. There are plenty of people who would find incredible use from something you haven’t touched in years.

You can either give the items to a family you know, a charity or you can have a garage sale. In the case of a business, do you have old equipment it is time to let go of? What about multiple items that are simply taking up space or collecting dust?

When you release what you no longer need or want you create the space for something new in its place.

You may want to focus on one room at a time cleaning and rearranging from top to bottom. One of the most exciting parts of spring cleaning is the joy you feel as you remember how special items came into your life.

I often hear stories from people who have gotten a teddy bear from my shop and relived the original feeling they had when they first got the item. I have been told what an incredible feeling they get when they spring clean and carefully rearrange their bear collection. They have a renewed feeling of pride over their collection because of the care they are taking in preserving the precious gifts.

In each room it is recommended to begin from the top and work down. This is true for cabinets, dusting, and washing.

When you are done, enjoy what you have just accomplished. Sit back and look around, take in the fresh fragrances and appreciate a job well done. Reward yourself with a good meal and quiet time.

For the office project, take the team out for a fun meal or order in. Acknowledge the gift of a fresh, inviting home or office you are blessed to enjoy. You will be glad you did.

Patricia Twitchell, aka The Teddy Bear Lady of Myrtle Creek, is the proprietor of Just Bears and Stuff, a unique gift shop located in Myrtle Creek, Oregon. As one of the main Boyd’s Platinum Bear Dealers in Oregon, Just Bears and Stuff has one of the best selections of specialty gifts for family, friends, co-workers and customers. Receive “Beary Special Moments” a free online teddy bear facts and tips e-zine by visiting http://www.justbearsandstuff.com

The internet is a wonderful place; many of us use it on a regular basis for a multitude of functions. Email helps us to keep in touch with family, and friends all over the world and most people have at least one email account. The growing use of digital cameras and camera phones means that we can send pictures at the click of a mouse. MP3 players have become increasingly popular, and we can download songs to play on them with extreme ease. All of this is great, and the internet is becoming a big part of our everyday lives.

Unfortunately, there is a downside to all of this increased use of the internet. That is the growth of the spread of viruses and other so-called ‘malware’. Originally, internet hackers were satisfied keeping their attentions focussed on government and business websites, and their viruses were intended to attack corporations. Most hackers saw this as a challenge. However, there is now an increasing trend towards home computer users being targeted by these attacks. The amount of damage that can be caused by a virus varies, but there are a number of easy steps that a person can take to help increase their internet security.

The first step to keeping your computer free from viruses is to have up-to-date antivirus software running on your computer. You need to make regular checks to ensure that your software is updated, and to scan your entire computer for viruses. There are a number of cheap, and free antivirus software programs available that provide excellent protection. You can find these by searching through your search engine for antivirus software.

The next step to maintain your internet security is to be extremely cautious about the type of files that you open, or download. The majority of viruses are actually spread through email attachments. Having these on your computer, in your inbox, is not the danger; the real danger is when you open the attachment. It may not be obvious that anything has happened when you first open the attachment containing the virus, quite often they appear blank. The damage is caused by the program that is activated within the attachment. If you do not know, and trust, the person who has sent you the attachment then delete the email.

John Rivers is owner of Security Profs.
Introduction to Internet security using personal firewalls, anti-virus, anti-trojan.

Recent computer problems raised my suspicions that a hijacker or
other malware program had infiltrated its protective software.

Too many crashes and program hang-ups were taking place to be
normal. Yes, there really shouldn’t be any problems in a virus
and spyware free computer.

But, who is blessed with such a pure machine?

The experts nearly all agree that upwards of 90 percent of all
computers used to visit the Internet are infected with some sort
of virus, adware, spyware or malware. And even though my startup
routine includes automatic sweeps by two different spyware
sweepers and one virus scanner, stuff could still get in.

So, I tried a new anti-spyware software advertised in a recent
newsletter. This program indicated that two of the nastiest
browser hijackers in circulation and two equally nasty malwares
were buried in my Registry and ‘ini’ files!

I was dumbfounded! How did my top rated protective programs miss
them? Not only did they get by the start-up protective software,
but they apparently slipped under the gun-sights of the registry
monitor that operates in the background, and the monitor
(Webroot SpySweeper) that sweeps before shutdown.

What really aroused my suspicions was the price tag to have this
new program remove the infiltrators. It was quite high compared
to the price for registering any of the popular and highly
recommended protective programs, some of which will remove
spyware for free.

Before spending that amount of money for a suspicious product, I
did a Google search for [”Name of Anti-spyware program” +
Avoid].

Yes! It was shown as Rogue/Suspect Anti-Spyware(*) at
SpywareWarrior.com along with another 199 similarly suspicious
offerings, and advice on how to avoid being duped or robbed by
False Positive findings.

(*)”Rogue/Suspect” means that these products are of unknown,
questionable, or dubious value if used for anti-spyware
protection.

Spyware Warrior is a great website to bookmark for future
reference. Here’s a link:
http://www.spywarewarrior.com/rogue_anti-spyware.htm

These are the programs I used to confirm my suspicions. None
found the four infiltrators:

Spybot S&D,AdAware, Xoftspy, Xcleaner, CWSshredder, HijackThis,
AVG, and ErrorNuker.

It’s possible that the Suspect anti-spyware program would have
removed them.

I wasn’t going to take that gamble. It’s bad enough that spyware
and adware are disabling millions of home computers. Exploiting
this epidemic with fake programs that claim to remove these
pests for an exorbitant fee, but might not, is unscrupulous and
unconscionable behavior.

The internet is undoubtedly a fantastic resource for families and offers a rich vein of educational content.

However, there are potential dangers - welcome to the seedy world of viruses, spam, trojans, pornography, spyware and other nasties.

These are the Top Twelve Threats No Computer User Should Ignore.

1. Viruses - A computer program that copies itself. They often disrupt your computer system or damage your data. Viruses are usually received by email attachments so be careful opening anything from a dubious source. They can affect anyone, for example, the destructive Mydoom worm affected one out of three small and mid-sized businesses.

2. Spyware - Sends information about you and your computer to somebody else. Spyware may send the addresses of sites you have visited or worse still, transmit personal information. With today’s concerns about identify theft this is a real worry. For example, CoolWebSearch may hijack web searches, home page, and other Internet Explorer settings. Spyware is normally received as part of shareware or freeware downloaded from the web.

3. IP Spoofing - A technique to gain unauthorized access to computers, whereby the intruder sends messages to a computer with an address indicating that the message is coming from a trusted host.

4. Trojans - An apparently legitimate computer program that is really intended to disrupt and damage computer activity by sending information, perhaps even passwords onto a third party without you knowing. As an example, recent emails entitled “Osama Bin Laden Captured” attempted to download the “Trj/Small.B.” Trojan if the embedded URL was clicked. This trojan attempts to hijack the PC.

5. Spam - Unsolicited mail often promoting products of a dubious financial or sexual nature. Don’t leave your email address on websites and internet bulletin boards as they are harvested by spammers.

6. Adware - puts advertisements on your screen. These take many forms including popups, popunders and advertisements that appear later, even if your browser is closed. Some are sent using the Windows Messenger service which allows a spammer to direct an advertisement straight to your computer by sequentially sending messages to IP addresses. Always irritating, they are also often of a pornographic nature.

7. Diallers - for those of us still with dial up modems, dialler programs redirect calls to a very expensive number. You won’t know until you get the bill.

8. Hijackers - Hijackers take control of your web browser and may reset your home page, search bar and search pages. They can redirect you to undesirable sites or stop you going to particular sites.

9. Hackers - With so much personal data available online to anyone with a password you must be sure your password is secure. If you are using your mother’s maiden name, your cat’s name or your birthday then your password is at risk. Here are two tips for making a secure password. Method One - pick two random unrelated three letter words and two digits. Mix them up and what do you have? A secure password such as “red19cat” or “hotpin73″. Method Two - pick a short sequence of words such as Now Is The Winter Of Our Discontent Made Glorious’ and you have a password of “nitwoodmg”. You could even change the I’s and O’s to digits.

10. Phishing - Emails purporting to come from reliable sources such as Paypal, Ebay or your bank. Often wanting you to verify your account details, they can look very realistic but are generally scams to harvest usernames and passwords. Always open a new browser winder and type the address there, rather than clicking on the link provided.

11. Hoaxes - Chain letters, scams, false alarms. At best they take up time and bandwidth but at worst vulnerable can be victims of fraud. Pass it on!

12. Stranger-danger – For those of us with children - do you know what they actually do when they are online? Are they working on homework tasks, downloading illegal music or pornography? Or are they chatting to strangers in chat rooms? You should consider blocking access to undesirable sites and logging their activity with a surveillance tool. Oh, and don’t forget that where children are concerned, computers should always be kept in a family room and never in their bedroom.

Three Step Action Plan

There are three basic, essential steps that should be taken to ensure your PC is kept threat-free.

Firstly , be sensible when opening attachments or following email instructions from apparently reputable sites.

Secondly , make sure you are using the latest service pack of Windows as Microsoft is continually closing loopholes to tighten up security.

Finally, there’s a range of low cost tools such as firewalls, antivirus, spam blockers and spyware killers available. Like everything else they vary in quality and you tend to get what you pay for so always do your research first and perhaps try a free trial before getting your credit card out.

The author, Kai Chandler, edits http://www.surfcontrols.com which specializes in providing reviews and recommendations of top-rated tools to help protect your online experience.

Satellite radio has quite literally been a god send to people who live or travel regularly in remote locations, or even for people who are required to travel long distances. Static-free reception can now be experienced and enjoyed by listeners who have a satellite radio even if they are
in the remotest of locations.

In the past if you were travelling for long periods, every hour or so you would have to start tweaking with the radio dial, as the radio station you were just listening to began to turn to static after it seemed to fade in and out for a while. You would then frantically try to locate a new radio station to listen to and just as you did, it too would turn static. This would go on until eventually there were no
decent stations left on the dial and then finally you would succumb to putting on a cassette or a CD or even turning off the entire stereo all together. But with the advent of satellite radio, static, tuning, fiddling and complete boredom will soon be a thing of the past.

The standard, more conventional radio signals are only able to travel around 30-40 miles from their original
transmitters so if you travel beyond this distance then the signal will eventually get weaker and weaker until you are no longer able to hear the transmission at all. However in a far greater development of technology, satellite radio waves travel from space (around 22,000 miles) meaning that you will be able to travel across the entire country without even having to change national radio stations because the frequency will be consistent and strong.

Automobile manufacturers have been installing satellite radio receivers as standard fittings for some years now, so
when the satellite radio transmission finally begins most drivers will be able to clearly access the signals and won’t
experience any problems in utilizing the new technology. What a revolution!! Currently there are only three space-based radio broadcasters who are working on the
development of this technology. In 1997, the government agency the Federal Communications Commission gave licenses
worth around $80 million to these companies to experiment and deliver on the allocated radio band for digital satellite radio transmission.

These three satellite radio companies have conducted completely different research programs and as a result naturally are now offering different products to the market.
As a result there is more then likely going to be a ‘VHS versus Beta’ type battle between the companies as the
technology progresses. Two of the companies, XM Radio and Worldspace have made a formal agreement to share new
technological developments with the other party and to make every effort to work collaboratively to develop and design
further innovations in this expanding communications field. This partnership can only be a good thing for consumers,
particularly consumers who frequent remote locations on a regular basis and who need to communicate with the outside world when they do so.

About the author:

Corbin Mathieson is the webmaster of
Ask Satellite which is a
premier source of information about Satellite. For more
information, go to: http://asksatellite.com

Broadband DSL has opened a whole new world of creative
opportunities for individuals and businesses alike. DSL has made
ordinary internet browsing extraordinary. With astounding speeds
and reliable connections, broadband DSL puts a new spin on
sending and receiving e-mail, streaming audio and video, and all
internet activities that are best preformed with a dependable
speedy connection.

Broadband DSL allows users to receive telephone calls while
surfing the net, so why not see the person at the other end of
the line? DSL users with similar capabilities can go online and
talk face to face in front of internet webcams. DSL users can
virtually connect with other DSL users on the other side of the
world. Internet phone calls can link broadband DSL users for
virtually pennies per minute, while leaving telephone lines
open. Gone are the days of expensive phone calls and overpriced
per minute charges to friends and loved ones. Broadband DSL has
opened endless windows of communication for users all over the
world.

Businesses and employees benefit greatly from the technology of
broadband DSL. Office networks can be accessed at lightening
speed from home or anywhere that provides a broadband DSL
connection. Video conferencing and virtual meetings lower and
often eliminate travel costs and miscellaneous expenses by
implementing the power of technology. Broadband DSL often makes
the impossible, possible.

Changes and technological advances in the world of broadband DSL
are happening all the time. Even now, most individuals and
businesses never come close to implementing all the capabilities
and power that broadband DSL has made available to them. Dial-up
modems are now antiquated and too slow for many individuals, let
alone businesses where time is of the essence. Other types of
broadband technology once considered fast and reliable are also
lagging behind DSL. Broadband DSL is the wave of the future, and
the future is available now.