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I want to thank Joe and Amy over at Nine Lives Media (The Var Guy & MSPMentor)  and NimSoft for hosting the webinar where I won this great device.  You see I have been looking at Ebook readers for quite a while and I could never get my head around how they could really be worth the money.  But that is before I touched one and now that I have I can say; "Yes they are" and it isn't just because I got mine for free.  I read a lot, at any one time I have 4 or 5 books around my house that I am reading.  When I travel I have to decide which ones I am willing to take based on their size and weight.  Also I get most of my books online so when I order then I have to wait for them to get to me.  This Kindle fixes all of those things.  The first thing I noticed when I took it out of the box was the screen, I never really understood how an Eink screen worked, the text was crisp and the grayscale images were sharp on this thing.  The setup process was easy and you can load documents you already have either over the air (for a small fee) or via the USB cable (for free).  The process for buying books can be handled on the computer or from the Kindle directly.  Making the Kindle much like the IPod in the way that it makes buying music and movies easy and more of an impulse purchase.  Items that are purchased from Amazon get delivered very quickly.  I have now been using it several weeks and I have read several books, a few converted PDFs and a few BLOGs (again thanks for Nine Lives Media for the free subscriptions) and I haven't experianced any eye strain from using it and think the layout works well.  I love being able to have one "book" that I can carry where ever I go.  The device is pretty much always on since the off mode is more of a hibernation.  The navigation is a little "old school" with the thumb control but it works.  This device does exactly what it is supposed to do and overall does it well. If you get a chance to check any of the Ebook readers out close up I suggest you do, that is the only way you can truely understand why you really want one of these things.  You may find the Nook or Sony's Ebook reader more to your liking, but any way you go this is the next evolution in reading.

So what was the last book you read?  As always I welcome your comments and feedback.

First let me say, I love to read.  I will read almost anything whether it is good or bad, magazine, newspaper/website, or book.  I believe the day you stop reading/learning is the day you need to go ahead and hang it up because someone else will be reading and learning and surpass you no matter what your field is.  With that being said I keep a list of books that I want to read based on recommendations from different people and as I finish one book I pickup the next.  I recently got to a book called The Go-Giver by Bob Burge and John David Mann.  It had been recommended by 3 different people with 3 very different backgrounds.  I can say that I have not read a book that was that short and sweet in a while.  It took me less than 2 hours to read it.  it took me about 3 more to read it the second time as I worked to grasp what I had missed on the first pass.  I won't bother getting into the story that the book tells, but what I will say is that the concept behind putting others first in your life is something that everyone can use a little more of.  I know that many people will look at this book and think it only applies to sales people and choice not to to add it to their reading list, but I think those people will be missing an opportunity to better understand the effect that our willingness to put others first has on our personal success.  I have always believed myself a person who loves to help others.  I love being able to answer questions and solve problems that help people.  I also love being able to bring others together who can help each other.  With this book you learn 5 very simple "laws" of Go Giving and see how the people in the book apply them.  What I wish the book did a better job of was showing how many places each of these laws can be applied.  But once you have really gotten a handle on the concepts you should have no issue thinking of thousands of places you can apply them.  After reading the book I am now seeing how each interaction I have in my life is an opportunity for me to help others, whether it is my wife, my employees, my clients, my friends or complete strangers.  I hope you will take the time to read this book and see how it can effect your personal success.  I would love to hear your thoughts once you have read it or if you have already read it.

I spent the morning last Friday with a very passionate group of educators at Westside High School here in Bibb county GA.  The Macon Chamber of Commerce setup a program that allowed local business people to see how our local schools work, ask questions of the administrators and teachers and hopefully become more involved.  While we work with a number of schools system throughout the state,  I have never spent any time in our local school system as a community member.  Laura Perkins the principle did an incredible job of making me feel welcome at her school.  I had been concerned that this would be a dog and pony show, but I was wrong and completely taken back by Ms. Perkins' candor and openness about her school’s successes and needs.  While spending a little time with Ms. Perkins when we first arrived we were able to ask questions that were on our minds about the Bibb County education system.  And as with many schools, Westside High struggles with test scores and keeping children engaged.  Ms. Perkins didn’t pretend to have all of the answers, but did discuss what her school was doing to address their needs.  I was then given the chance to tour the school and sit in on a technology class.  I will say I was impressed with the facility that Westside has allocated to their technology curriculum.  The teacher that was teaching the class I sat in on was very passionate about her students and what they were learning.  She told me the biggest issue was not bad kids or lack of facilities, but was the need to be able to show the kids what they could really do with what they were learning.   After listening to several presentations on hackers from the students I offered to talk to the students about what we do at Infinity Network Solutions and how what they were learning could be used.  I also took the opportunity to try and impress upon the students the things that took me way to long to learn the importance of.  I talked about the needs to be able to communicate and specifically being able to articulate your thoughts in conversation with people.  I told the students about how being a life long learner was the only way to truly be great at anything.  The most important point I made and I hope that at least one person hear, was how important your social network was to your ability to achieve your goals.  I will tell you that after seeing Westside High School and it’s students and faculty I have a better appreciation of the education system in my community and challenge anyone reading this post to take any opportunity you may have to learn about your local system and how you can be involved.

A friend of mine sent me this website the other day. http://www.letssaythanks.com It is something that Xerox is doing to help all of us say thanks to the troops.  They have about 50 different card designs done by children from around the country that you can pick, fill in you name, hometown and a message and then Xerox will print and mail the cards to a service member.  I can tell you the site can be slow from time to time, but if can spare 5 minutes please do so and be sure that our men and women in harms way know that no matter what we think of why they are there, that we care about them and appreciate what they do to protect us.

So a while back when the Blackberry Storm first came out on the Verizon network I rushed out and got it and as you can see in my previous post I wasn't exactly thrilled with way it performed.  But I have continued to suffer along with it because I have a rule about using what I buy.  I was just about to give in and move on to something new (The Droid was set to come out) when I saw that the Storm 2 was coming out.  I guess RIM decided that the first one was such a mess that they had to come out with version 2.0 less than 12 months after the first one.  I shared this comment with another Storm 1.0 users who informed me that not only was the Storm 2 coming out but an upgrade for the first Storm was out and it really improved it.  I scoffed at him, because RIM had been putting out new code for the Storm since almost the day it came out trying to make the thing actually work the way it should.  But being a glutton for punishment I downloaded the upgrade and gave it a role.  To my amazement my Storm started acting the way I would have wanted it to out of the box.  The applications launched quickly, the keyboard responded, the screen rotation actually rotated with my movement of the unit.  Now I am not going to tell you that the Storm 1.5 is the best thing out there, but I will tell you it has made me hesitate with regard to moving on to another unknown phone like the Droid.  At least for a few more days.  I will let some other sucker be the first one to try it and let me know what they think this time.  So someone hurry up and try the Droid out and tell me if I can ditch the Storm for something more perfect.

So for the past 7 days I have been running Windows 7 on my office PC and I can say it has gone great.  I decided that I needed to reload my system due to a number of applications not running right and thought that I would go ahead and see what Windows 7 was going to be all about.  So far I am impressed.  The installation felt like it took less time then Vista and I know it took less effort to get installed (not as many questions).  Once installed I found a number of user changes I had to get used to.  Most notably the fact that the control panel no longer has the option (That I can find) to run it in classic view.  This made me getting the system attached to my domain a little more cumbersome, but I was able to get it done.   When I began putting my applications back on the system there were a number of the Windows "Are you sure" prompts, but there were fewer than Vista.  I was able to get everything back up and running within a few hours.  After a week of using it I can say that it runs faster and more stable than my Vista install ever did.  I had a friend show me this link to a page on Microsoft's site that has short new feature videos to watch.  The "snap" feature is probably one of the coolest I have seen.  The "shake" video is a close second.  So if you have been living with Vista and want a better experience go ahead and upgrade to Windows 7.   If you are on XP then you have decide if you want to do a full reload like I did.  Just remember to backup your files first.  If you are going to purchase a new system, be sure to get it with Windows 7, you won't regret it.

Before we get into how to pick a technology partner let me ask another question; have you ever thought about what your staff really does when your some or all of your IT systems are down?  I know you say they do all of the "other" things that they never get to do.  Yeah right.  I wonder if it really looks more like this: What Happens When the Network is Down .  I hope not, but with many businesses both large and small when you IT systems goes down it costs you large sums of money per minute because the work you are expecting to get done isn’t happening.  So picking the right technology partner is critical to your success.

So what does it take to ensure that you pick a technology partner that can deliver what you need when you need it?  Recently Wendy Bahr talked about the value of picking the right technology partner on one of Cisco video BLOGs.  I think picking a partner is less about the certifications and tech know-how.  You expect a technology partner to be experts in the products they sell and service they offer.  You also expect good customer service.  If a technology company does have the know-how or doesn't treat you right you will leave them and they probably won't be in business very long.  So when picking a technology partner what is it you should be looking for?  I think it is about the understanding of and care for what your business does and what makes your business unique.  It is about how the technology will enable you to grow and/or improve.  When you are talking with someone and are considering a new technology partner you should be the one talking more than they are.  They should be asking questions about how your business runs, what your goals are and what is stopping you from reaching them.  Only once someone understands those things can they really begin to see how what they sell and do can offer you real benefit.  And it doesn't stop there, a true technology partner should be communicating with you about your business and where it is going on a regular basis.  Not every call or visit should be able selling something to you.  Good partners will spend their time to stay up to date on your industry and your business and want to provide research when they can.  So next time a technology company comes calling and starts talking about their latest product and its wonderful features and not talking about your business stop them and ask them to talk about how it will improve your business.  Don't let them get off talking about industry averages and generic RIO calculations, make them talk specifically to you and your operation.  If they can't then you know you don't have the right partner.

Have you ever had your time wasted by someone selling you a product instead of delivering you a business value?  Let me know about it.

This last week I saw a link to a PDF in the Eatonton-Putnam Chamber of Commerce newsletter on preparedness for the Flu Season from the SBA (link below).  While this article was aimed at small business any organization can get items to take action on from it.  While I won’t argue whether the H1N1 flu is worse than the normal flu, I can tell you that I am seeing more of my employees either working sick or calling in due to illness than I have in the past 9 years I have been in business.  I can also tell you that with the talk last school year of having to close schools and daycares due to outbreaks every organization has to consider what they will do in the event of an outbreak that impacts them.  You can be impacted by either staff illness that requires them to not be at work or illness of family that requires employees to not be at work to provide care.  Taking the time to consider what your plan will be and putting it in writing may seem like an exercise that you can’t afford, but can you afford not to have a plan and have to wing it during an emergency.  An emergency plan that is in writing and distributed to the management and staff of an organization can help ensure that your organization can continue to function in the event of any major business interruption.  As a technologist, I think one of the biggest parts of your plan should be consideration for remote access tools so that those employees that would normally come to work and “play hurt” can still do so without having to come to the office and potentially cause others to get sick.  If you already have remote access in place then you should be testing it now so that you know how it will work during an event and if you don’t you should consider implementation now.  Also now is a good time to talk with your staff about their sick leave/PTO and how properly managing it will ensure that both the company and themselves will be covered if they have to be out.  You might also want to consider talking with your major suppliers, vendors and partners to see what their plans are since their action plan or lack of one can greatly impact how your organization will function.  I am reviewing our plan, making updates and testing our systems right now, shouldn’t you be also?

http://www.sba.gov/idc/groups/public/documents/sba_homepage/sba_h1n1.pdf
(The article also has a page for steps individuals can take to stay healthy and what to do if they get sick.)

I am always open to sharing what we are doing and would love to hear how you have planned and prepared for business interruptions.  So please post comments and/or email me with your thoughts.

rbetzel@infinitynetworks.net

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