Would you give up alcohol for one year to prevent losing your digital data?

If you had to chose between losing all of your digital data or give up alcohol for one year? What would you choose? If you choose giving up alcohol then you can enjoy your year of sobriety along with 34% of other people that would choose to make the same sacrifice.

A 2011 survey, conducted by Wakefield Research and Carbonite, found out what some people would be prepared to sacrifice to save their data.

• “It’s More Valuable Than Vacation Time”:  50% would rather lose all of their vacation time for an entire year than lose all of the files on their computer.
• “It’s Even More Precious Than My Wedding Ring”:  38% of married Americans feel that it would be worse to lose everything on their computer than to lose their wedding ring.
• “I’d Pay Dearly to Get My Data Back“: 62% said they would pay to get back their lost data if their computer crashed; 21% said they would pay $500 and 27% said they would pay as much as they needed to get their documents and files back.
• “I’d Sacrifice Something I Love to Save My Data”: People would go to extremes to immediately recover all of their data if it were lost.
  • 34% would give up beer and wine for a year;
  • 31% would give up coffee for a year;
  • 23% would give up their cell phone for a month; and
  • 18% would give up their free time to mow their neighbor’s lawn for a year.

  Survey Reference

Storing your data on the cloud is great way to store your files without having to mess around with back-up drive.

Cloud Storage Tools that I Use.

Carbonite stores a complete back-up of your computer online – so in the event of a total crash you should be able to restore all of your system files and personal files. I have used Carbonite before, but I was not too impressed with the way that it worked, however I am sure they are constantly improving their service – check their facebook page to gauge user satisfaction levels.

I LOVE Dropbox-  for storing files that I use regularly and I also use DWD Drive for a back up of images, music and other documents that I do not use regularly.

I use Lastpass for managing passwords and Google Apps for mail.

Google and Facebook ad revenue 2011

Wordstream posted a great info-graphic illustrating which industries had the highest ad spend on Google for 2011.

Google’s ad revenue for 2011 was 37.9 billion compared to Facebook’s 4.27 billion (as estimated by research firm eMarketerr)

The Slide share presentation (below) reports on Facebook ads pends for Facebook in Q2 2011. It shows (on page 6) that the Top 6 growing sectors on Facebook are:

Random Facebook picture tagging is Spam.

I was recently tagged in a picture of a local businesses logo.  The business was preparing for an opening night so they posted a logo and tagged it with peoples names. The reason that people do this because when you are tagged in a photo it is posted to your news-feed, wall, my friends news feed and can even appear as one of the pics that appears in your personal photo strip. So basically, people are using your personal facebook page (and the existing relationship) as a means to get free advertising for their business.

This is by definition Spam

Wikipedia: Spam is the abuse of electronic messaging systems (including most broadcast media, digital delivery systems) to send unsolicited bulk messages

I believe, that when businesses engage in this form of spam they are under the mis-guided intention that they are actually engaging with their target audience. Although there is actually an engagement that takes places it is not a very nice once and not one that will leave a positive taste in peoples mouth. So it is not really and engagement but rather an irritation.

Further, in addition to this being outright spam, it is also violates the Facebook terms and conditions:

You can tag a photo only with the express consent of the user on whose behalf you are doing the tagging, and must only tag images when the tag accurately labels what is depicted in the image.

There have been instances when business have have been wiped from Facebook for violating terms and conditions such as this… so why would you bother to professionally present your business with this tactic?

Facebook photo tagging as a means of promoting a commercial venture is a cheap and nasty tactic that is void of any creative thought.

I recall reading a blog post a while back the story went something like this:

NAB bank posted a blatant advertisement in a non-commercial forum. The next day, people from the forum went into NAB branches holding placards that promoted their own businesses. Of course, NAB staff freaked out and called security to remove the people from advertising in their branches.  The point here, is that if you want to control the advertising that takes place on your physical premises or electronic assest then don’t take it upon yourself to advertise your own business via mediums that are not yours.

This is why Facebook has an option to advertise. You can start advertising with a small budget like $10.00 – you can target your message to your audience and prevent from pissing people off.

You do actually have the option of preventing people from tagging you in photos (Go to <<account << privacy settings << customise settings). Personally, I like the fact that my family and friends can connect with me via a photo upload – I just get frustrated when people help themselves to my personal electronic assets for advertising purposes.

Microsoft enters the Google Cloud

Well this is some good news to end the week!

Google announced this week that Google Apps users can now transfer Microsoft Office files into the Google Cloud AND you can share and edit your Microsoft docs in real time. Now, if you are not a Google Docs user then you are probably wandering what the fuss is all about. Basically, what this means is that you can now sync your Microsoft documents (excel, word & power point) so that other collaborators (that you have granted access to) can work on the same Microsoft document at the same time! It also means that you can access your Microsoft documents anywhere, any time from any computer.

Google first announced this feature last year but as of this week it is now out of beta and available for all to use.

Prior to this update, if you wanted to share a Microsoft document via your Google Docs account you had to upload the document (this is boring and takes time) and once uploaded you would lose 80% of the editing and formatting functions that are available within Microsoft programs. These two problems made the system of sharing existing Microsoft documents via the Google cloud kinda clunky and not so effective.

This technology (known as cloud computing) has been available for quite some time and Google is not the only provider. The beauty of this recent update is that I don’t need to leave my Google Apps account to store, edit and share Microsoft Docs AND I can retain the formatting and editing function offered within the Microsoft programs. Thank you Google and Microsoft.

I have been using Google Apps for the last four years and they are constantly releasing new updates but today’s news is definitely up there with the best updates of all time.

Review: Sunshine Coast, Naturally Refreshing

My 2 cents

The images are clear, lots of happy people, makes me feel like this would be a fun place to visit especially if I was married with kids (which I’m not)

•    Sunny Coast Hinterland totally missed out, very minimal exposure. If you don’t include the hot air-balloon shots- which is more of an advertisement for hot air balloons rather than the hinterland then I reckon the Hinterland received about 10 seconds all up.

•    There is a shot of a boy on a stand-up-paddle which is very political considering the latest permit debacle (if you consume as much local news as I do then you might not know about it – http://bit.ly/bJ8hAt ). We include the sport in our regional branding but we don’t allow the people, credited for bring SUP to the coast to have a permit for business. This makes me feel, um… a bit uncomfortable actually.

•    There is so much effort put into trying to educate people about safe swimming areas, it seems weird that we would then show a picture of people swimming in areas that are usually patrolled beaches.

•    I liked the music, thank god we didn’t get a cheesy backing track (I know some of you will beg to differ) It would have been nice if the artist was credited so I could hear more! I would love to find out if the artist was from the Sunshine Coast. It would be great to know if we supported local artists in the making of this clip.

•    The official press release states that the clip portrays “the genuine warmth of the locals inviting you in to enjoy in their beautiful part of the world…” um… not sure where the locals were – just looked like a bunch of tourist families hanging out the beach.

•    I don’t know much about the Sunshine Coast Creative Alliance but I doubt much of their vision got a look in. I thought it was a missed opportunity to not have included more of the cultural and culinary beauties of the coast.

•    I was waiting for the generic bustling nightlife shot, but it did not come, which is good as that would have just been misleading.

•    It also struck me as odd that everybody in the clip what your standard average white Aussie. I can only assume that this clip was not made to appeal any other market.

•    If this clip is targeted to white Australians then the product launch timing seems clumsy. I am told that Christmas Accommodation around Noosa is already booked out.  Maybe a launch in winter, when half the population of Australia is fantasying about being warm on the beach, would have been beneficial for conversions.

•    The other day I read that Youi Car Insurance did all the live footage for about 2 dozen TV ads in something like 6 days (not totally sure what the stats was).  Eighteen months for this little naturally refreshing beauty does seem like quite a long time.

Overall, the visuals were nice and clear & some of the shots were really well done.

I don’t think this clip managed to capture the essence of the coast, other than the beach, and when it comes to branding or positioning it is certainly not naturally refreshing, just the same old same old but with a new camera and a new tune.

Looks like some others out there my agree: Here is the poll results from Finda:

Sunshine Coast Needs a Cluster!

Have you heard of Coworking?

This week I am working from Melbourne. I found a great shared office space in Melbourne CBD called The Cluster. They have a range of office solutions one of which is to rent a desk space from just $35 + gst… This place is amazing (the website gives little indication of what a gem this place is). The Sunshine Coast desperately needs an office space like this. Hopefully the crew at O3Office.com.au (based in Maroochydore) can put something like this together for us Coast entrepreneurs.

I tool a few piccys whilst waiting in the reception area to give you an idea of the space. I am happy to have found a great office space in Melbs and encourage you to check this place out if you need a temporary office in Melbourne.