Wednesday, December 30, 2009

Web 3.0 - how it might work

If two different people each perform an Internet search with the same keywords using the same service, they receive different results determined by their individual profiles.
How come? This feature is one of plenty other ideas behind Web 3.0. The browser will turn into your personal assistant. It knows what you like and what you dislike and based on that it will do the searches, individual to any person.

All the predictions made about how Web 3.0 could become the next generation of the 'www'. I guess the predictions were made since Tim O'Reilly introduced the term 'Web 2.0' in 2004. The following terms appear all in relation to Web 3.0:
  • Web3D - the virtual world, SecondLife - like, Avatar
  • Semantic Network
  • Artificial Intelligence
  • Software Agent
  • new internet infrastructure
  • distributed computing
  • web as the main media delivery system
  • advanced collaboration tools
Every single feature is worth a single blog entry (so come back soon!). However, most of the articles I've found today were created at least 2 years ago, though 2007. There were many attempts to set up an appropriate Wikipedia article about Web 3.0 .. but to date .. none available. (web 3.0 wikipedia link)



Air cooling system in the Data Centre [Credit: The Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute]
We see distributed computing already happening in the so called 'cloud computing' area, ranging from Google Docs to DropBox. I am quite an advocate of cloud computing, as I don't like carrying around plenty of binders. But distributed computing is so much more. It allows the web to become a giant brain capable of analyzing data and extrapolating new ideas.

For enterprises, Web 3.0 will be the change from a website to a webservice. The interaction between customer and business will be much more intense. The customer service will be much more systematized and automatized, but at the same time the business can focus more on the customer and provide more service and support.

Sunday, December 20, 2009

Fasten Your Seatbells .. FAST ... it is Warp Drive

Warp drive is a FTL (faster-than-light) propulsion system used in many science fiction works. Fiction? No way, there is real science done with it. The physicist Jia Liu at New York University just proposed his idea for a spacecraft powered by dark matter in August this year. Spaceships as they are right now can't go very far, because they need fuel to actually come back, and this is quite limited in a spaceship's tank. Liu gives an example of an engine that uses the products of a dark matter annihilation.
The acceleration is proportional to the velocity, which makes the velocity increase exponentially with time in non-relativistic region. - Liu et al.
In a central black hole in the galactic center the density of dark matter can be that big enough to speed up a spaceship close to the speed of light.


Traveling the universe on the back of black holes (Image:George Marks/Kauko Helavuo/Stone/Getty)
If dark matter can move starships that would also be a great opportunity to finally have another source of alternative energy. Louis Crane published his ideas how to use an artificial black hole as a power source. Applying quantum gravity effects and things are not impossible anymore.

Very exciting times ahead. Just think about that dark matter is obviously abundant throughout the universe.
"A dark matter rocket would pick up its fuel en route," says Liu.

Again, nothing is impossible. We can reach the stars, because we have the physics to do it.

Friday, December 18, 2009

How to become more social?

In the view of Karl Marx human beings are intrinsically, necessarily and by definition social beings who - beyond being "gregarious creatures" - cannot survive and meet their needs other than through social co-operation and association. (taken from wikipedia)

Interesting. Would Mark Zuckerberg (founder of facebook)  agree do that statement? I don't know.

Personally I am not a person who is looking for the crowd of people. I am happy on my own or maybe up to 4-5 people. But that's it. Communication happens on several levels and with the internet the opportunities grow almost monthly. Face to face talk is not my strength and I am working on it. However, I don't hesitate to post or tweet my current status to thousands of people or to publish my profile. Does that mean now I am getting more social?


Photo Courtesy by Markus Brosch
Phrases containing the word 'social' are becoming buzz phrases.
Let's take social entrepreneur. My understanding of it is not more business talk. It is more giving back to community.
A social entrepreneur is someone who recognizes a social problem and uses entrepreneurial principles to organize, create, and manage a venture to make social change. - wikipedia
 So, what does social marketing means then? It is also known as social media marketing which then makes already more sense.
... a term that describes use of social networks, online communities, blogs, wikis or any other online collaborative media for marketing, sales, public relations and customer service. - wikipedia
Let's be a social entrepreneur and do more social media marketing. When we can make a social change by using facebook, twitter and blog ... nothing can stop us. Look at the number. Just use it wisely and in a smart way.

I achieved my goal for 2009 ... I am not antisocial anymore ... I have almost 2000 friends in facebook :o)

Wednesday, December 09, 2009

Meeting like minded people - Fusioneon


Photo courtesy by Markus Brosch 
What a day again! Half of the day I spent at Uni to work on my introduction chapter for the thesis. It is not the most fun, but it has to be done. I already got very helpful feedback .. actually all 26 pages have at least one comment or mark on them ;) Thanks Andrea! So I think I am on a pretty good trip right now. I see the light at the end of the tunnel and hope it is not only a train :D

It was also a day where I had to remind myself that it is not worth it to compare yourself with others. I tend to do this quite often and it is not really helpful if you want to achieve something and you actually want to enjoy the journey and the result. We are all on our own journey in life and you can't compare apples with pears ... completely different history.

I spent lunch time with a group of women. I am not that social, but I am getting there. Thanks to Cat Matson, who organised that, there is now a group of around 15 business women having an awesome time. The fusion event is a lot of fun and good food. I am always impressed about all the different business ideas coming up. The passion that some people have is amazing. When they talk about their business their eyes are sparkling. They love what they do! That is so important for me as well. This is also one goal for me ... to be excited to get up every morning and do the whole day what you love. That sounds like paradise to me.

So yes, I met really interesting people and I am looking forward to create really good working relationships. It is all quite a steep learning curve for me ... but I am enjoy it.

Sunday, December 06, 2009

MITs for Sunday done

Very efficient Sunday. I actually spend almost 4 hours on my thesis chapter. After I've learned that I 'germanize' the English, I started to doubt about my english skills. Anyway, no time to start some self-doubts. Things have to be done, espacially when you don't like them. Step by step. I reached the state that I will print this chapter tomorrow and do some offline reading. Maybe I'll find a victim who can proofread it for me.


The rest of the day I spent with some daily stuff I do, but also did some work on a website. Although I thought I am not such a design guru, I spend most of the time with Gimp ... amazing tool. (open source version of Photoshop) I guess Photoshop has similar features and power, but currently I am much quicker on Gimp, especially with a Mac ;o)

Working with websites you can't ignore css - cascading style sheets. I don't think I work with them in the most efficient way, but so far not too bad. I love the Add-on in Firefox, called Firebug (surprise, surprise). It allows you to see immediately the changes when you tweek on your css file. Yes, on live websites as well. That includes a big learning curve ... loving it.

The website I am working on is not online yet, so no link, sorry. However, exciting projects ahead and they won't have to do all with websites.

Monday, September 21, 2009

Why am I on a 1500cal diet?

You can call it whatever you want ... I am in the progress to eat healthy the way I have chosen. Currently I am following the 1500cal plan from Lite'n'Easy. This sounds really not a lot, but I was surprised. When you really "spread" your input through the whole day, let's say you eat something every 2 hours, you are not starving. And you don't feel stuffed either, which I think is an awful feeling as well. 

Another thing I have noticed already after 2 weeks, I am not tired anymore in the early afternoon. Before that, I was deadly tired and I didn't get anything done between 1 and 3pm. And it is not easy to find something to lay down in an office, hehe.

What this diet also allows me to do is having some kind of gratification once or twice a month. The pictures below show what I mean. I can eat that without feeling guilty afterward. Yes, I felt stuffed and it just reminded me that I don't need so much food. But I loved it.



I really enjoyed this desert in the Belgium Beer Cafe after a full pot of mussels.

And no, I haven't lost weight yet, but I am sure over time it will come. The next weeks I will be away from home and can't really follow the plan, but then I will be back on it again.

One thing I might change with the plan of Lite'n'Easy is that I swap lunch with dinner. I still have my believe that you should eat the smallest meal in the evening, and with Lite'n'Easy you get the main meal for dinner. When I can, I will swap, depending if I am home or not.

In general I am very happy with Lite'n'Easy. The delivery and the meal are just convenient for me as a person too busy (and lazy) to cook.

P.S. I am not an affiliate of Lite'n'Easy, so I don't get paid to publish this here. All this is my own personal opinion.

Thursday, September 17, 2009

research in real

Being a research PhD student could be lot of fun. But research has a quite boring part as well. (I am not talking about the whole administration stuff here) Doing the research itself is lot of fun and I like the time puzzling around with some application and writing my own scripts, Perl, PHP , SQL etc.

But then there are these seminars you have to go to, although they are not in your field of interest. Yes, I do respect other researchers and I let them do what they like to do ... but why do I have to listen to it? I do respect the Beatles, but I don't have to listen to them.Yes, they could introduce new techniques you haven't thought about, but if it is really out of your field it won't be really relevant.

 
Photo courtesy by Markus Brosch
I am somehow permanently in such a situation, as I ended up in a group full of labrats, oops I mean cell biology scientists. And here I am, sitting 24/7 in front of a computer in my world of applications, code and visualisation.
Just imagine, having a group meeting with these guys ... plenty of fancy pictures on the wall, live imaging of cells, fluorescent tagged proteins  ... is amazing stuff. I am loving it. Then my presentation ... charts, tables and numbers and everyone starts to yawn.  Not that I didn't yawn at their presentation ;o) They are coming out with their ideas and how to improve the assays etc. It is not helping my work. But how can u get around it?
  • chose the right research group straight at the beginning
  • make clear with your supervisor what info you need and which seminars you really have to go to
  • don't change the environment too often (I did move offices several times, with no real benefit at the end)
  • have a goal and stick to it
  • finish your PhD thesis as soon as possible
  • avoid any procrastination ... it is just getting more painful
I am in the final stage of my PhD, so I won't change things anymore. But I learned a lot, no doubt about it. Maybe more about me instead of biology ;o)

So let's get this paper published and then we start the final part, a quick analysis.

Tuesday, September 15, 2009

Why are we so obsessed about food?

In a previous blog I have written about my attempt to be on 1500 cal daily. However, we know that an average human being should consume up to 2200 cal. This is plenty of energy to have a quite active day, including brain work.

Although I am a scientist, or maybe because I am a scientist, I don't see obesity as a disease. Unfortunately with the help of the media we start to call it like this. But why should it be? Isn't it logical that obese people just consume more energy than they actually need, for whatever reason I don't understand. Why are we so obsessed about food? Is it all about pleasure, addiction or are we just bored?

Just last week I saw a quite obese women with her similar obese daughter. They couldn't sit next to each other, as it would have been quite squeezy. (Yes, I support airlines charging obese people for two seats!) What is this woman doing to her daughter? Taking care of your own child doesn't mean making a child sick for the rest of its life. I don't want to go over all the cost obese people cost us in terms of environmental and health issues. I just don't understand how people can be so irresponsible. When you have a child, you have some duties. And I am sure it doesn't include to poison your own child.

I might sound a bit harsh. But as a human being you have a purpose here on earth. We are so lucky to be alive. The chance to live is smaller than winning in a lottery. The human body has much more to offer than we are actually aware of. Skills we knew thousands of years ago, but got lost because humankind got greedy over time. I just hope 2012 will bring a change and will open the eyes for all of us. Being a bit more grateful for what we have and not taking food for granted.

Photo Courtesy by Markus Brosch
 Just eat healthy and less! We don't need meat every day. Look at gorillas ... quite muscular species .. and vegetarian!

Monday, September 14, 2009

Abstract Thinking

One of the most wonderful skills a human can have is abstract thinking. I think it is a skill you can learn, however, some technical interest can be very helpful.

Having an idea and your brain starts immediately to break down the whole process into small pieces and steps. That can be scary and if you are lucky you will see that you can save a lot of time when you don’t go that way. For me it is cooking. All the steps necessary to get a nice eatable meal on the table, spoil the whole fun and therefore I prefer other sources to get food.

In business, we can have plenty of ideas about how to use email marketing, which emails to send out in which order and to who. I already see the flow of action set up, leading to a flow chart. This process would already include the setting for the Double Optin, the details about the OptOut feature, tags we will apply to customers, and which link we will make trackable. As you can see I don’t really care about the content. One part I have delegated.

One very useful language to express abstract thinking is UML, Unified Modeling Language. It can be very powerful. It helps me to trace every possible occurring case in a software application, let it be a website or just the email marketing followup sequences. Maybe you can even claim it to be the protocol of this application. It helps to understand the what if case.

I also like to see abstract thinking in the world of object oriented programming. This is almost seeing the world through different glasses. You work with classes, instances and getter and setter functions. At least that’s what I have done during my time with Java.

I am not saying that it makes the world easier, but I think it gives you a different (sometimes better) view of the world around you and it put actions and objects in a different relation to eachother. My bike is just another instance of the object bike, nothing more or less. What we human do with it doesn’t matter to world of objects.

I am definitely not the guru in abstract thinking. Just sometimes I discover myself dreaming in an abstract way .. or is it just my way? ;o)

It is all relative.

Friday, September 11, 2009

Your personal project management

The topic "Project Management" is mostly covered for companies and small teams. But what about managing your private project. How do you manage the projects/actions that were assigned and delegated to you. You are in charge of actions set up and you will be responsible for the results.
Studies often point to interpersonal and behavioral problems as root causes of project failure. The art of project management is all about getting work done through other people.
Personally I am following the strategy of GTD - Get Things Done. It might be a bit modified so it suits my circumstances. Everything is set up on paper. I would prefer to have my ToDo list on my computer, but I am switching too often between computers right now. The list of projects can be quite long, depending how detailed you are. I think having a project called "Do website" makes no sense, because this can be a never ending story. I am still struggling with this part ... but I am going there.

Then I have a list of things I want to do one day. Maybe I am bored one day, which I don't believe will happen ;o) Another list is about actions I have delegated and I am waiting for the feedback. I also have some kind of inbox where I put all my ideas, thoughts and other things that come to my mind. It is not a physical inbox. Mostly it contains notes of a meeting.

Photo Courtesy by Markus Brosch
My whole agenda is only A5 and I want to keep it like this. It is a bit more handy that carrying around a A4 binder. It also trains me to keep my notes short but still detailed.

Weekly I review all projects and all the other sections in my agenda. Just to keep things clean. It allows me to remove unwanted actions, plan the coming days and make me aware of the status of every single project. If no action was taken for a little I might consider to put the whole project on hold or even cancel it as it might not be important.

Currently I am not really well on track with that. Just bought a new binder as the old one starts to fall apart. As soon as things become routine I get bored of them ... looks like I need a new strategy soon.

Wednesday, September 09, 2009

Australian BusinessWomen Network ... Join Us

For more than a year now I am member of the Australian BusinessWomen Network. Just today we will have another webinar about Online Business Boosters. I like the webinar series ... awesome topics. Sometime you know stuff already, but then there is also information that are new to me. Every event can be also visited by non members.

I would love to be more involved and participate in more programs they are offering, but as mentioned before I have to manage my time properly. As soon as I will have finished my PhD I will get a bit more active.

I like the idea of the checking out their Mentoring Program HerMentor. My final goal is to actually mentor others in my area of expertise. A mentor can give your business and yourself a big boost. It can have an tremendous impact, and this is what I would like to experience. Hope they will provide a mentor who can "fight" with me ;o)

Suzi Dafnis, the founder of ABN, is also the "maker" of the inspirational website herBusiness. All the resources a women needs to run a successful business.

In every bigger city ABN runs some MeetUps .. so far Brisbane is a bit behind. But hopefully we get this up and running asap. I am already in contact with some other members. Although, I am the skill to be quite anti-social, meeting up with like-minded people is very important to me.

You can look up the ABN website for business resources and free article about any area of interest regarding your business. Social marketing is big for ABN as well, you can find us on facebook, LinkedIn and twitter.

What I can say ... all information is out there, you just have to know where it is. ABN is a wonderful tool for your business to stay focused, motivated and have the right people around you.

Monday, September 07, 2009

How to manage time

We have learned that time is meant to be the fourth dimension. However, it doesn’t seem to behave like the first three dimension. We can move forward and backward, left and right, up and down to discover space. But what about time? It seems to let us go only in one direction, no chance to go back to the past. Is that true? We can remember the past, but we can’t foresee the future. We can’t be 100% sure where we will be the next day.

That’s one reason why we don’t have subjects like space management. But there is a subject like time management. Space is unlimited (my believe, it doesn’t need to be true), but time is limited. Everyone has 24 hours 365 days in every year of his/her life, which is limited. There is an end. I believe that it should be taught at school, how to invest your time and not to spend it. It is well described in the book 'Wink' from Roger Hamilton. You can invest your money and get back more. The same is valid for time. Invest your time wisely and you will win time at the end. You will gain time for the things you love to spend time with, might it be family, hobby or traveling ... anything you wish.

Time flies ... (Photo Courtesy by Markus Brosch)
Back to the management of time. Are you spending your time or investing it? In a job you are exchanging your time for money .. so you spend time. You even lose time which you could spend with your family. As a business owner and entrepreneur, I have to chose wisely where I will spend or invest my time. I prefer to invest my time into my business. Smartly done, this will end up in systems that work for themselves and make money ... like any business should do.

Another way to invest time is exercising and eating healthy. You might gain some time to live longer. These years you can spend with traveling, grandchildren and great grandchildren. You don’t want to miss that!

I am currently sitting in the train going from my partner’s place to my place as I do it every week. Could be a quite time wasting exercise. Instead, I am writing my blogs, review emails or listen to educational audio books from Anthony Robbins or Dr John Demartini. I am learning and therefore investing my time. That’s the advantage of using a train instead of a car.

The time I spend on my bike every day going to Uni I see as a time waster. These are 40min I spend on the street without doing anything valuable. Yes, you can say I am doing some exercise ... but I am riding my bike for more than 20 years now .. and I actual don’t like it. Time waster. (Yes, I could make it more fun.)

But even I have times where can’t stand getting more input. Then I can do some exercise like running or gym or ... yes, I lost a bit the social part in me. I am getting used to watching movies at least once a week, but that is already challenging. Not really my thing. Might need to re-discover my hobbies ... I just love to spend my time in a smart way :o)

Saturday, September 05, 2009

Customer Relationship Management

It was this year that I have started to look into the area of Marketing. If you told me this 5 years ago, I would have said “No way”. Yeah, things change ;o) The main challenge I see is to automatize the whole procedure. I am not a copywriter, therefore I am delegating this part. Someone else can find the words for me.

When you look in different areas longer and in more details, you mostly find out that there is a lot to learn if you want to become an expert in this area. A bit frustrating for people like me, who are interested in too many things.

The most exciting thing I found out so far is email marketing. Auto-responder and follow-up email sequences are so power full tools. You write these emails once and they can go to thousands of people in your target market. There are plenty of web services who offer this kind of automatization. BigResponse, iVertical or aweber ... all well known and respected tools. The prices are reasonable, taking into account that once the email sequences are set up it all runs by itself.

Infusionsoft - try it free

But then we came along InfusionSoft. It is a monster tool and I mean it. At first it looks quite overwhelming, but as soon as you set up one feature, you want to use all of them. You can run a normal business with it. It is a complete customer relationship management including shopping cart, email client, sales management and affiliate program and so on. For our friends of Outlook, you can integrate InfusionSoft here as well.
CRM+Email Marketing+eCommerce=Double Your SalesThe main reason, why I like InfusionSoft is the simple feature of tagging. As simple as it sounds, none of the other email marketing tools provide this feature. And tagging, just labeling things, is so powerful. You want to send an email to everyone who is in Australia, older than 18 and interested in red wine. When you have this information on your customers, you can filter them according their tags and you go ... It reminds me of the settings for an Ad in facebook, similar process.

I have written about customer service before, so I think InfusionSoft is one of the companies that “walk the talk”. I know there is other information in the net as well, but I speak here just for me. The information material is just awesome: nice brochures, manuals, webinars and help desk. Just recently I used Twitter to contact them ... got my DM in 2 minutes. We had a couple of telephone conferences in which we could ask questions and with go2meeting we could share a screen, so we could see things live. It was a one-on-one conversation. Very helpful.

For who is InfusionSoft? Although this tool looks professional and huge, I can recommend it to small businesses. Just for the reason, you will grow. They even guarantee it. If you are in business to make profit and keep a good relationship with your customers, InfusionSoft is the tool to use.


However, Infusion3 Steps to Double Your SalesSoft didn’t start perfect and keeps growing and learning as well. I have read in some forums the critics on their API. There is not much I can say, as I haven’t used it yet. And yes, obviously the customer service seems to be not perfect either. I had only good experiences so far. And yes, you can’t use InfusionSoft in Safari, what a pain ;o) The world is turning to Mac anyway, so no real reason to worry about, hehe.

As I said, if you are serious about your business, I recommend you InfusionSoft. The investment in money and time is absolutely worth it.

Friday, September 04, 2009

How much are 1500kcal?

It is one of my goals to reduce my weight by around 8-10kg. I wouldn't call myself obese, but there are bits and pieces I would love to disappear. I am approaching different strategies, of course the combination of all would be ideal.

  • exercise: I am following a strict plan to exercise every second day for at least an hour. That can be in the gym or I go for a run. Looks like the I tend to build up muscles quite easily, so I prefer running to gym and have reduced the gym to once a week. It is not my goal to look like a female Arnold Schwarzenegger. I also think I would love the running if I would some some improvement one day ... but still after month and years ... I am still getting out of breath easily. I am applying now different strategies, like long and easy run OR alternating the speed. Will see how I go.

Photo Courtesy by Markus Brosch
  • nutrition: As a German, I have my issues with some food here in Australia. I did put myself on a 1500kcal diet right now. According to the standards, this is a medium level ... but I am starving during the day. I am following the plan of a company who provides the food as well. So far ... my compliment ... very nice food. Much, much better then most suppliers on the UQ campus ;o) However, I believe the amount of breakfast (with a late morning) snack is not enough. For dinner they provide the main meal. Ok, change of attitude ... I love the dinners. I think it is ok, when you have dinner before 6pm. I am an early morning person ... so I have my breakfast at 5am ... then a snack between 8-9am ... and I start to starve for lunch around 11. I might increase my input to 1800kcal next week and we will see how I go. I haven't lost any kilo yet.
  • is there anything else I can do? ...

Tuesday, September 01, 2009

Did you blog today?

Writing a blog can be soooo difficult. I have a list of things I would like to write about. And yes, I would like to write with at least a bit of quality, so people might like it and come back. To reach this I have several choices:

  1. Keep writing until it gets easier and better. OR
  2. Write content in advance and leave it at least overnight, re-read and improve and publish the next day.
  3. ...

You are right when you think ... she must use choice 1 right now ;o) Yes, because I made a commitment to write every second day. And no content is prepared and nothing is in my head right now. But I am committed.

Seriously, if I want to become a good writer I need to follow at least some kind of strategy. I know that I am not the Creator type ... but I still would like to spread my knowledge. At least the knowledge I cannot monetize yet ;o)

From time to time I have a look at the WriteToDone blog from Leo Babauta and Mary Jaksch. Some small tips worth putting into practise. Another hint that strategy is needed. So, what's the plan?

Photo Courtesy by Markus Brosch
  • List all the topics I would like to write about. That can be a list of 3 things or a list of 50 things. I tend to list a lot of things as I call myself "multi-interested". Normally blogger say you should blog only about one topic. I just don't want to maintain several blogs ... so I will give it a try with one blog.
  • Stick to your writing schedule of twice or three times a week. The longer your blogs the less frequent you write. I find it hard to follow regularly other blogs. I have up to 15 blogs I am following rss-ed in my Mail application. But I am definitely not up-to-date.
  • Plan the month ahead in your calendar. Put down the topic with maybe already some notes. That sounds like a good idea, at least to me. I might give it a try.
  • Try to provide at least one image per blog ... humans remember pictures more than words.
  • I have read several times that you should comment on other blogs to put your word out there, but also to get some kind of interaction. I don't think it is worth to comment on old blogs ... let me know when I am wrong.
  • Create the title of blog when you have finished. You will be surprised how the content can change when you are in your flow ;o)
Ok, let's make it happen. I will sit down and schedule my topics for September.

Sunday, August 30, 2009

Some nerdy stuff ...

As part of my business (one of them ;o) ) I am setting up and maintain websites. I think a basic website is easy to set up and doesn't require anything special. But for business purpose I think that is not enough. If you want to talk to customers through the website and persuade them that your products and service is all what they need and want right now ... you need a pretty good website and the right content.

However, I did some work with CSS (cascading style sheets) yesterday and also discovered some fancy Firefox plugins.

1. The idea was to have a fancy background image. The issue is of course all the different kind of browsers and screen sizes. It is ok for the image to get stretched and shrinked to the screen. And as always Google is your best friend. Drupal is already full of containers but I needed another one, just straight after the body tag in the html file. But just before I put in the img tag with the background image and a class defined in the css file.

The body was refined in the css file as followed:
font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;
width: 100%;
height: 100%;
overflow: hidden;
The img tag class has the following styles:
width: 100%;
height: 100%;
position: absolute;
top: 0;
left: 0;
z-index: 5000;
And the addition div I have added just after the body tag is styled this way:
z-index: 6000;
height: 100%;
width: 100%;
position: absolute;
top: 0;
left: 0;
overflow: auto;


2. YSlow is a fancy tool from the Yahoo developer guys for developer guys. It is a Firefox add-on and easy to get up and running. It gives you good tips why a website can be soo slow. But I have no idea if that is actually SEO friendly.

3. I am using Firebug already for a little why. Awesome how you can play with the html and css code and you see the changes straight.

4. Too lazy to google? Get CodeBurner and you have html and css references straight available.

5. And finally, some of my mates will be happy to hear that I finally made it to install NetBeans. I hope it is a useful tool. We had already a pretty good start this morning. It did some nice formatting of a crapy html code ;o)

Friday, August 28, 2009

My research seminar report

On Thursdays we have our Division seminar at the institute. Doing my research in computation biology most talk I am attending to are bioinformatics talks. Yesterday's talk was entitled "Improving Wool through pharmaceutics". I am personally no fan of pharmaceutics neither any kind of drugs. But I was curious what this guy was up to.
I didn't know that Australia is the biggest wool producer in the world hosting more thann 100 million sheep. Wow, this country has soo much space for a reason ;o) To be honest, I haven't seen one sheep yet, but I have only seen parts of Queensland and mainly cities.
However, why improving the wool quality? Like in every business money is the key driver. The better the quality, the more cash you can ask for. The most important features of wool are fleece weight, staple length fibre diameter and color. These feature you can measure. And you can only change things you can measure ... Lords and Mechanics, here we come ;)


So, how can you improve the quality? If I undersood right, Metyrapone is the pharmaceutic that is given to lambs. This obviously improves the wool quality for at least 2years. According to wikipedia:
Metyrapone (Metopirone) is a drug used in the diagnosis of adrenal insufficiency and occasionally in the treatment of Cushing's syndrome (hypercortisolism).
What has this to do with the wool of a poor baby sheep? Yeah ... this is what they are trying to find out at our institute. Which gene is affected? And what is inhibited or enhanced when you give this drug.

For me that is a very unusal topic but still interesting.

Wednesday, August 26, 2009

Customer Service ...

... is a hot and widely discussed topic. It can make the difference for a business to fail or succeed, especially SMEs. I am not the person who likes to give phone calls neither having a face-to-face conversation with a sales person. It is just not my thing. I am getting more "inspired" in emails and filling out webforms.

I recently contacted a magazine I really like and asked them about a previous issue. No reply, not via webform neither by direct email. I was disappointed and most customers would obviously give up at this point. But lucky for the, I really wanted this magazine. So I stepped out of my comfort zone and gave a phone call including another 20min being on hold. That's how badly I wanted it. Obviously my patience was worth it. I got everything I wanted.

Was that bad service or just bad luck that my information didn't go through? I always try to see things from different perspectives. You don't know the person nor the system set up on the other side (if they have a system). Unfortunately, the business would have lost the sale/opportunity anyway.

Photo courtesy by Markus Brosch

There are companies out there, that are well known and highly awarded for the best customer service ever. Did I mention I have a Mac ;o) So, good customer service is most likely a win-win situation, isn't it? Unfortunately, in some regions we don't get the choice between different suppliers. This issue occurs especially in telecommunication. Then we have to live with the service they provide, like >60 min on hold? This doesn't look like a win-win situation, not to me.

I am convinced that this will change and such companies will need to improve their customer service. Technology improves rapidly and when you are ready for it, the world is open for you. And that brings in so many opportunities to chose from. Companies need to be more flexible, if they are clever enough and listen to the market.

Monday, August 24, 2009

Internet Marketing ... and what?

What is this internet marketing? Why is it soo different to offline marketing OR is it actually different?

I am sure everyone has seen at least one of these loong sales copies for some specific product on the internet? They include at least 3 different testimonials videos. They use 10 different fonts and in all available font sizes. And not to forget all these different colors. Is that really so appealing to people?


According to some internet marketers, yes. They obviously make 6 or 7 seven figures cashflow a year by just producing one page after the other. Affiliate is the big word.

I have to admit, I went to one of such a seminar. I guess the presenter told us the truth, but does it work for everyone? He presented the way he set up the pages, how he chose the product and how he market the page.

Yes, the webpages are simple, nothing fancy. And it is all legal what he does ... so what?

I guess the hardest part is to find what people are actually looking for? What does the market want? It is not that you can go out there with your products and expect that people will buy. You have to come up with something that solves their problem, that makes their life easier.

Keep searching ...

Sunday, August 23, 2009

Project review

When I go through my twitter messages and facebook statuses ... it really looks like I am quite busy. And yes, I am doing a lot of stuff. Maybe because I get too easily bored in something. Ok, let's get some structure in it.

VitaPal.com - Discount Vitamin Warehouse
1. PhD ... actual the main reason why I am ended up here in Australia. I am in the final year of my studies in Computational Biology. It is an amazing area to work in. However, maybe I am in the wrong research group or just the wrong University. I did publish two publications in my first 2 years ... then my motivation dropped. Where was the fun? I don't get a long easily with people around me and I started to question scientists and science in general. Did you know that 99% of all written PhD theses are never read again? Doing a PhD is the complete opposite of team work ... and what did we learn about team work ... different minds coming together and working on one goal together.
Anyway, I will finish hopefully in the next couple of weeks. I might need a break of this for a while. Maybe then I will find a way back, as I still love the subject of Biology.

2. Health/Nutrition/Fitness ... according to the BMI I am close to be overweight. However, I think I look alright. The scale tells me something else, so I decided to drop 8 kilos. The plan is to avoid any drugs to have a quite "organic" body. I am good at this. Beside that the problem with my thyroid will be always there. Maybe I can get my mind to repair it again by itself. It is all about what you believe. The majority of food/fuel I put in my should be organic. I can't handle meat and fruits from supermarkets. I have some kind of allergy against preservatives, which might be actually good ... I can do some testing , hehe. Fitness-like, I think I still haven't found what I really enjoy. The gym can be good sometimes, but I build up too easily. Maybe I give it another try. I did Kung-Fu some years ago and I loved it. But then they did more team games, and that is not my thing. With the personal trainer of my partner, we did some boxing lessons. And that was some fun, and it gets all the frustration out of you ;o) To start it at Uni, might not be worth it ... will see. Currently I just do some running. At least every second day with the plan to increase the time and distance.

3. Business ... I am registered soletrader here in Australia for 2 years now. I am doing contract work for other companies right now, but plans are bigger than that. I want to provide service B2C and B2B. The website is in progress and the list of ideas is full and keeps growing. I know very interesting people and I am sure I can make it.

All this keeps me busy. Recording it here, will make me more committed to it. Today's plan is update two websites and getting a new one up and running. I also will learn more about our CMS and about Internet Marketing. About all this I will write here in this blog.

Have a lovely weekend!

Thursday, August 20, 2009

Getting the shoes ready .... off for a run

Just this I started my exercise program again. Why again? … Looks like I have lost a bit of commitment the last 2 weeks. I did nothing. Anyway. I did my first 25min this Tuesday, with no pain, so I can keep going.

But what keeps me going? I have the inner urge to move, especially when I am in front of the computer 24/7. I love my business and the work that is involved in it. But the human body needs a balance. I am not really attracted to the gym anymore. I still have some sessions to go.


The advantage with running is that I can let my mind wander. It is not really recommended to dream during the gm session ;o) During the run, I can re-build my goal and vision. Why I am I doing this? What do I love on the project I am involved in? Where do I want to go, and what are the next steop to do, to bring me closer. Lot of runners have their iPods plugged in, but I am not attracted to use this way of entertainment. But maybe I will listen to some motivation speeches from John Demartini or Roger Hamilton. Ah yes, I should listen to “Wink” again.

Wink Book

Hopefully I get this back as a habit again. Yes, I get too easily distracted. This blog will help me stick to it. I need to be accountable in business and it starts with simple things like exercising.

Just getting ready here for a late afternoon run. Will do the usual 25 min round here at the campus. Maybe I will apply some kind of variation. I am thinking about to alternate between slow and fast speeds. Let me see how I feel, my nutrition today was not really reasonable.

Have a wonderful day!

Josefine, the Mechanic

Monday, August 17, 2009

G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra

Yes, I made the big move to see a movie last Saturday. I am open minded, so I obeyed and we went to G.I. Joe. Maybe I should mention we had yummy chocolate before, just have a quick look at the below image and you know what I mean.


Back to the movie. My overall opinion: it is a good movie. The highlights for me are the pictures and the design - awesome quality. When Duke and Ripcord follow the car in their fancy suits, that's reminded me of "Transformers". Might be the same technique behind it, but somehow cooool.


The story itself is a bit flat ... almost fairytale like. Still, the US has now a "new" president, kind of open end ... what now? Nothing against an happy end, but was it necessary that Duke and Ana get together at the end again? Almost too girly ...

One thing that made me really angry is the violence in the movie. Don't get me wrong, it is ok for adults. However, before the movie, I saw families coming into the cinema with kids, not older than 10 and even younger. HELLO? It was quite heavy violence in the movie. This is a movie based on a cartoon that's sole purpose was to sell a set of toys to 5-12 year old boys. The movie turned out to be strong sequences of action violence and mayhem throughout. What kind of parents are this? You don't let a kid watching something like this, at least I wouldn't do it.

The age limit in Germany is set to 16 y.o. where here in Australia it is 12. Big difference for me. But ... these kids I have seen were much younger. I am soo angry about this ... but what can you do?

Overall good movie! (I don't know the cartoon!)

Friday, August 14, 2009

Office phobia?

When do you know you just do too much?

Just this morning I felt sick when I was riding my bike. It’s not that I ate something odd, but already two days earlier I didn’t feel well in the office (maybe office phobia). Yes, I am under some kind of pressure. I put it on myself. There a plenty of projects I am involved in and I am setting up my own business, but I love it. My goals are big and I am getting closer every day. But what is the price I am paying for it?

1. I really prefer the presence of a computer near me than a crowd of human. Yes, that makes me quite anti-social, and …?
2. I don’t get gratification as often I sometimes would like to (I think that is common to all PhD graduates, ;o) ) I put in more time and money then I get out of it so far. But that’s part of the journey. This is also the reason why people prefer to be employed and fear the fact to be self-employed of having their own business. It can and will take years until you see some profit coming in. The vision and goals keep me moving.
3. This might be the highest price I am paying … health and lack of fitness. I find eating healthy quite time consuming. The preparation and especially the shopping are such time wasters. I don’t know why I should shop for 4 hours to have a meal for 10min. I’ve found an interesting e-book called “The Lazy Raw Foodist’s Guide” from Laura Bruno. This might be a good source of information. I haven’t read it yet.


4. The lack of fitness is only half the truth. I was committed to sport for maybe a couple of months. Just didn’t do anything the last 2 weeks. I still know how to run and I might be back in the gym next week. Not might be … yes I will be back :o) … I still have the goal to finish at least a half-marathon. So, let’s do it. One hour run in the morning should be doable.

Maybe as usual it is just a question of being organised. I am following GTD quite strictly and see some progress there. Maybe I just forgot to include some free time for me ...

Any other tips and suggestions are more than welcome.

Wednesday, August 12, 2009

Make the Most of Your Membership

Just right now I am a participating the Australian Business WomanNetwork (ABN) webinar with the above title. As I am a member of this network I am following ABN's whole webinar series. The topics are pretty good, not deep knowledge, but a good reminder of things you better look at in your business.

So, how do you make the most of any membership anyway? When I look at my password list, I am a member of plenty of groups, networks and circles. More online than offline, but that's fine with me ;o) I don't think just "collecting" online friends is not very useful. It should be about communication. However, I don't mean heavy posting of your opinion/status or whatever, it is about smart communication. Just yesterday I followed a webinar with Paul Dunn from B1G1. Paul just made it again. He is not only the WOW wizard he is also a media Wizard. Amazing in how many way he tries to contact people and presents the idea of B1G1. It was a mixture of live chat and live presentation. Very well done!


Communication should be always 80% Listening and 20% talking. Exchange ideas, ask questions, give tips and hints for free ... there are many ways to communicate. This can be one way of making the most of a membership.

Some points to be aware of are:
  • It is important that you know what features the network/groups offers, but also use them. For example, blog your opinions or about things the group could be interested in and ask for comments. Such things allow you to reach plenty of people without spamming than.
  • It is also important that you follow the rules in a group. It is about respect other members.
  • If you are group or network is kind of a paid subscription, use it badly. Join every event (if appropriate), ask questions, get help. That what it is made for.
  • Put up a picture of yourself ... I personally don't contact people that are using the default image. You still want to see who you are dealing with.
As mentioned I am part of several networks. Feel free to join me in :
ABN just launched a forum section ... another way to communicate. It will grow you and your business.

Monday, August 10, 2009

Simplicity

A simple lifestyle means for a lot of people being poor. I disagree with that. I am actually trying to simplify my life, so I can focus more on the things I love to do. What do I mean?

The main question is, What do you value more - money or time?. I go for time, because time it limited, money is not. There are endless opportunities out there to make, find or work for money. But that is not the case for time. Everyone has 24 hours for 7 days in a week the whole year, no more and no less. Therefore I am trying to reduce anything that just wastes my time, so I can better invest my time in other projects. How do I do that?

The one and only time killer for me is shopping, especially food shopping. Everyone who knows me a bit better, knows how much I suffer after the second row in a supermarket. There is no fun for me in it. So, I go shopping online. Most supermarkets here in Australia offer online shopping and delivery. As I am a bit allergic to preservatives, I have chosen www.myfruit.com.au ... they do delivery here in south-east QLD. I save plenty of time. I don't need to carry all the heavy fruits and veggies (not that I am buying chocolate or meat, *blush*). As I don't own a car yet and I am on the road mostly with my bicycle, I would have needed to go shopping several times a week. That's why I have chosen the online version.


Not only a time saver, but also a space saver are online documents, for almost anything. I love when my bank sends me an email about the latest statement (especially when lots of number in the right column). That will be downloaded and backed up on my time-machine. All good, no hassle with paper and binders. Of course you have to be organized. That makes things so much easier. Leo from ZenHabits is the best example. In his blog, he describes how to be as simple as possible. I would reckon you have a look.

To be simple means you have to be organized. Everything needs its place, no exception. I am not saying I am perfect in that. I can make it for some days, but then I discover myself being lazy. That means, refocus, thinking of the time it can save me and back to simple.

What are my other goals to be simple? Having a cleaner, would make my life a lot easier. First I would save some time, second I would love to be at my place and third no need to be bothered, because you know the cleaner will come this week. The other issue I have is transport. I spend a lot of time in trains and busses. Some kind of "beam me up Scotty" would be just awesome. Maybe a scooter would make me a bit more flexible. Although I reduced the "stuff" I have at my place, there are still some boxes that could go. Still looking what I could ebay or maybe just give to charity.

Organised as I am, now I will do the next step on my to-do list for today, setting up a resource page on www.informpros.com.

Friday, August 07, 2009

Private Label Rights article about self-development

This is one of my first project of my recent founded business with Mark D Nicholls. I am very excited about the company and everything we want to set up. So, let's rock it.
Private label rights is a concept similar to reselling, but the merchant is permitted to modify the product to fit his or her needs. Typical PLR products are articles, reports, eBooks, and autoresponders. This kind of content is used for the purpose of allowing multiple buyers to invest in the content with free rein to alter and use it by claiming authorship of it. It is typically used in online affiliate marketing systems. -Wikipedia - Private Label Rights (PLR)

I think that is an awesome opportunity to share content, to modify it to your needs and to drive traffic to your website. With excellent self-help private label rights articles the content is already optimized to bring visitors to your website and provide them with valuable information. You can use them as they are or you can tweak them to provide a unique perspective. You can also combine them to create totally new products. The choice is yours.

self help material

Just recently I actually properly listened to the song from Michael Jackson (RIP) "Man in the Mirror". I wasn't never really aware of the lyrics, but I loved it.
I'm Starting With The Man In The Mirror; I'm Asking Him To Change His Ways; And No Message Could Have Been Any Clearer; If You Wanna Make The World A Better Place; Take A Look At Yourself, And Then Make A Change

Isn't that what self-development is? There are still plenty of issues I have even with myself. I judged people from the first impression .. and how wrong was I and still am! I even have the impression that this is not fair. The first impression is most likely to be wrong.

People call me being a capitalist. That sounds quite negative, but I see it differently. I am setting up my own business, because I have issues working for someone else. That is fair enough. Also, I have decided for myself to be wealthy, so I have to do something about it. And I am convinced, having a "normal" job won't be really helpful, so I've chosen another way. Because one of my driving quotes is:
Only when you are wealthy, you can share wealth. And only when you are happy, you can share happiness.
You set the levels yourself. I love to help people. I even would say I am too nice, almost sacrificing myself. But this way, I am limited in giving. If I want to give, I need sth to give.

self development
With this project I want to reach all the personal development coaches. If you have a website and/or a running newsletter and you are looking for inspiring content, check out this page. This website will help you with:
- How to keep the website and the newsletter interesting?
- How to make people coming back to my website (loyality)?

You can write content yourself, but are we permanently inspired to do so? If you are serious in having a proper relationship with your customer, you might consider this website.
While you can use your PLR health articles to promote your website in new and interesting ways month in and month out, there are some limitations to your private label content from this membership page.

The great thing about having a membership is that you can take the PLR articles and content packs and bend them, shape them, and mold them to your needs. Each month, without fail, you'll have all the content you need to keep your website looking fresh, to make new and interesting offers, and to really drive traffic like never before.

Take the initiative today to generate a constant flow of traffic to your website that will bring in targeted prospects and profitable sales.

I wish you all the best