A Top Site for Finding Work

Best of the Web/Top Site for Finding Work – Job-Hunt.org is a “Top” or “Best” site for job hunting and careers according to US News & World Report, Forbes, and PC Magazine.

“Job-Hunt is dedicated to the millions of people who have had their personal lives disrupted by the loss of a job.“

The Internet Has Changed How We Live Our Lives. How We Communicate. How We Date, Work, Play…

and how we look for work. More and more we go online. And where the people go, that’s where you’ll find the criminals and predators. Please be aware that Identity Thieves have – for some time now – been posting fake job openings, fake employment websites, and various other employment scams online.

Some time ago now, I wrote about “cyber-safe” resumes, and I received a nice letter from Susan P. Joyce at Job-Hunt.org. She reminded us that,

“The recession has multiplied the scams, and people need to be very careful using any job board or even “employer” Website – not just when using Craigslist (which is often a good source of jobs).”

Please see the excellent, Job Search Scam Avoidance Guide

Job search scams look very appealing, and even smart people “fall” for them. The result can be loss of the money you do have, trouble with the IRS or other law enforcement agency, and identity theft when your SSN is provided to the fake “employer.”

And if you are (or you know someone who is) in the process of seeking a new job/career, please click here, read, and learn how to “Put the “Safe” in your Cyber-SAFE Resume by modifying the content of your resume! Take control and create your own privacy protection this way, without depending on the Web job site to do it for you. Do this to protect your existing job, if you have one, and your privacy.“

Related reading: Cyber-safe Resume Gets Noticed

Copyright 2007-2010 © “Tech Paul” (Paul Eckstrom). All Rights Reserved. post to jaanix.

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Just Say “No” To mylife.com

* * * ATTENTION: I AM NOT MYLIFE.COM, IN ANY WAY AFFILIATED WITH MYLIFE.COM, AND CANNOT HELP YOU WITH YOU MYLIFE.COM. — SO I HAVE TURNED OFF COMMENTS. THEIR NUMBER IS 1-888-704-1900 * * *

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Everyone in my address book received an e-mail from me asking them to join MyLife. To each and every one of you, I apologize. Please, just delete it as the spam it is.

How that happened was, I was asked to write a review of a “new” social networking site, and so I had to ‘enroll’ and become a member.. which involves building my “profile”.. which involves importing “who I know” (aka “contacts”).

The site/service in question is called mylife, which appears to me to be a mashup between the professional Linkedin social networking site, and PeopleFinders Reunion, the “locate long lost friends” site.

MyLife.com Banner Logo

“Find Everyone & Stay Connected
across the web’s most popular sites”

Of course, you need to sign up, and of course, it’s “free to join”.

The first thing you’ll see is a full page ad for contact lenses (which you’ll need to find the teeny-tiny “no thanks” link). Then you’ll see another full-page ad.. and then you’ll be provided a form to fill in your personal details and build your MyLife “profile”. And you’ll be asked to import your contacts by providing your e-mail addresses and login passwords.

Please read that last sentence again.

Presuming you do so, and allow mylife to vacuum up your contact list (which is sent via unencrypted HTTP) it will then go through the Web and find any mention of them on the Web (such as, finding their Facebook page, Linkedin profile, etc.). It shows you some results, and

If you spend more than 20 seconds on MyLife, you’re going to see this page. If you want to click any of the links this service provides, you’re going to see this page. You’re going to see this page a lot.

Because this page is what MyLife is all about.

If you have ever used (or..tried to use) a free “people search” type website, you know how they work. You enter a person’s name, and they produce a list of results.. usually including the person you’re looking for. So you click on the “details”, or “contact”, or “more” button/link, and you’re told that access to this data requires “membership”. Same with mylife only worse.

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* * * ATTENTION: I AM NOT MYLIFE.COM, IN ANY WAY AFFILIATED WITH MYLIFE.COM, AND CANNOT HELP YOU WITH YOU MYLIFE.COM. — SO I HAVE TURNED OFF COMMENTS. THEIR NUMBER IS 1-888-704-1900 * * *

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I don’t think I’ve ever seen a site nag you to buy like MyLife does. Incredible.

Let’s say there was a case of “user error”, and it was my fault that all my contacts got spammed (with my name on it), I still could not find one thing to recommend MyLife.
Two big thumbs down.

[update: MyLife is the same folks who brought us Reunion. David Lazarus of the Los Angeles Times has accused social-networking site Reunion.com of abusing e-mail contacts. The company’s aggressive marketing tactics require you to surrender your address list to join up, in most cases. The site then sends out invitations in your name to all your contacts.]

[further update: for those of you with concerns about how your personal information is used (and sold), I strongly urge you to read, Mylife.com: A new tool for bargain-seeking stalkers. ]

LinkedIn is the only “social networking” thing I do. It is free and it is aimed at professionals (everyone I have ever talked to who has “looked ip old friends”, has done so on Facebook.). And if you really do a lot of looking up people (say, for genealogy), use Ancestry.com. You can get it free at your local library in most places.
And, oh yeah! Try Google. Put the person’s name inside quotes for exact matches.

… doubt I’ll be asked to do another review.. but I call ’em as I see ’em.

Addenda: I have received several e-mails asking how you remove mylife from a computer…

I don’t understand this. MyLife is a “service” you sign up for.. sort of like Facebook, or Twitter, or.. a webmail. It isn’t a program you install, or a malware infection like a virus. If you signed up, you have to log in to MyLife and unsubscribe. To stop receiving e-mails from them.. well, about all you can do is add a rule to your spam filter (sometimes called a “blacklist”) and block them. [for webmail, see Managing your email: eliminating the junk, and in a mail client see, Managing junk mail in Outlook/Thunderbird .]

* For those of you who want to learn about the proper way to un-entagle yourself from social networking sites: How To Remove Your Name From Search Engines and Social Networking Sites

* To see real life complaints (other than in the comments below), click here.

Copyright 2007-9 © Tech Paul. All rights reserved. post to jaanix

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* * * ATTENTION: I AM NOT MYLIFE.COM, IN ANY WAY AFFILIATED WITH MYLIFE.COM, AND CANNOT HELP YOU WITH YOU MYLIFE.COM. — SO I HAVE TURNED OFF COMMENTS. THEIR NUMBER IS 1-888-704-1900 * * *

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The Numbers Are In

I have, as almost all Websites do, various statistic gatherers and counters, which tell me all kinds of interesting tidbits about this site’s traffic and visitors. (And I confess I look at these statistics frequently.)

I started Tech-for Everyone in June, 2007, and have been writing – 6 days a week – ever since. Today I fiddled around with my stat counter and set it to “all time” mode.. To give me the “big picture”; not only of what you, Dear Reader, seem to like and “click on”, but also to see/sense how the search engines work. The majority of my ‘pageloads’ come from search ‘referrals’.

My Top 10 articles of all time are:

1. How to boot from a CD
2. Manage Startup programs in Vista
3. “My Taskbar disappeared” and other simple tweaks”
4. Scare Tactics
5. Adding programs to your Startup Folder
6. Quick Tip: overcome “access denied” in Vista
7. Find hidden files
8. Adding Firewire to your machine
9. Hibernation vs. Sleep+Vista
10. Yellow exclamation mark question

It seems that there’s an awful lot of people Googling (yes, that’s a word now) “How do I boot from a CD?” Over 50,000 of them so far.. about a hundred a day, average. What does that suggest? Well, I’m not sure.. couple of things leap to mind.

Well, there’s an airport run shoehorned into my schedule, so I’ll wrap this musing up by inviting you to click on any of those articles that might catch your fancy. I’d also like to remind you that this site is searchable too, with its own search box (located over to the right in the widgets column).
There are over 500 answers, tips, and tweaks in my archives..

Did I mention that I look at my stats frequently? Yes? Well, the truth is sometimes I get a little carried away.. and become just a teeny bit “stat happy”. Symptoms of “stat happiness” include: crying when your numbers go down, and spending hours “tweaking” your site’s keywords and metatags.. and thinking of ways to slip “hot” Google words into your text. Like; giveaway, free, sex, hot sex, XXX, Paris Hilton, Brittany Spears, secret video, (let’s see.. hmm..) hidden camera, product key codes, crack.. (There. That should help.)

Today’s free link(s):
Fearless New Year’s prediction: Computer crime gets worse. Roger Grimes makes his cybercrime predictions for the coming year, and they’re not filled with good news. Get ready now for a new wave of cybercrime coming to a computer near you.

The new MD5/SSL exploit is NOT the end of civilization as we know it. MD5 insecure? Absolutely. SSL hacked? Sort of, but it’s not broken. CA negligence? What do you think? Tom Olzak examines the roles of each of these players in the recent problems with SSL.

Copyright 2007-9 © Tech Paul. All rights reserved. post to jaanix

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A Noteworthy Achievement

Folks, I can tell you you that being an Internationally Renown 6 days-a-week Tech Blogger is a challenging, difficult, and often unrewarding endeavor. Coming up with fresh topics, properly doing your research, writing and rewriting, etc. is time consuming, and it’s work.
On an ad-free site, such as this one, there is no (read $0.00) financial reward.

So why do people blog? Or, maybe a better question is, why does the number of blogs double every six months? Can you earn a living blogging?
(an absolutely wonderful in-depth article looking at these questions can be found here, http://alexiskold.wordpress.com/2007/11/15/who-is-blogging-and-why/ {yes, it’s a bit dated, but still accurate.})

The fact is: something like 90% of all blogs fail (or, “go inactive”) within just a few months. Or sooner.

One thing that that keeps me going is the support I’ve received from fellow bloggers.. and another is stats.
(https://techpaul.wordpress.com/2008/03/29/nobody-reads-me-on-saturdays/)

My Website statistics show me all kinds of interesting things about you, the “site visitor” — the most important one (to me, anyway) is how many of you are there?
If I went to all this work and trouble, wrote 400 How-To’s, and only six people read them (total)… well, even a dim bulb like me would figure out that I could spend my time more wisely.

Which brings me to today’s title:
There are some rewards to being a member of the Tech Blogger community, and one closest to my heart is the support I’ve received and friendships I have made since starting Tech–for Everyone.

And so I would like to point your attention to a man whose Tech Blog was the very first one I put on my “Blogroll”, and ask you indulge me while I acknowledge what to me is a remarkable achievement.

Bill Mullins launched his Website, titled, Bill Mullins’ Weblog – Tech Thoughts — Security and System Tools and Tips. Software Reviews, News, Views, Downloads and Links on January 1st of this year. It has not quite reached its first ‘birthday’.

Since I discovered his site, I have referred my readers to several of his articles, and generally recommended it every chance I had– but most especially when he would share his security expertise with his readers, and/or warn of a new cyber-crime threat.
I consider his site an invaluable resource, and wish every web surfer would read it (and follow his advice).

Today, when I looked at his site, I noticed that his StatCounter showed over 500,000 visits. Wow! Remember when I said 90%+ fail within weeks? Well, there’s also another factor… most blog viewers land on a handful of “popular sites”.. and bloggers like me get the crumbs.
500,000 readers in less than a year is remarkable!

So I invite you to join me in congratulating Mr. Mullins on a job well-done, and suggest to you that you click here and take a look-see at his site if you haven’t done so yet.

PS– No. Mr. Mullins did not pay me to write this (and is probable unaware that I have). Remember? $0.00?

Copyright 2007-8 © Tech Paul. All rights reserved. post to jaanix

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Google, Spell Check, puzzle games*

I suppose I’m not alone in this, but I am a stat-watcher. It is a way for me to learn about you — the reader: about what topics you’re interested in and which ones you don’t bother to investigate (“you” in the broad sense). I love to get into all the statistical details, and sincerely believe that a fella cannot be presented with too many informational statistics — and I always want more.

I am fascinated by “keywords” that catch your eye: a great ‘for instance’ is that this blog is for the most part a ‘how to’ and is almost always posted in that “category”, and yet only one “view”, so far, has been linked from there. (What is that telling me???)
It surprises me sometimes that my “catchiest” titles have the lowest number of views, and that I would get a lot more Google Search “hits” if I simply titled a post “System Restore”…as an example. (Now I don’t want you to think I’m ‘hit-desperate’, and would start resorting to such tricks. I’m not. Honest. But it does make one think...)

I am fascinated by which of my “Today’s free links” get used and which one’s don’t so much. It says nothing about which one is more useful than another, but it does tell me some things. For instance, apparently my readers already have anti-spyware tools or just aren’t concerned about malware, yet a large number just as apparently delete files they’d like to get back. Curious. At least to me it is.

But the most interesting statistic is the Search Engine Links, which shows not only how many people found my article via a search on Google (Yes. I know. There are more engines than just Google.) but what words they used in their searches. These “search terms” have been the source of ideas for posts I’ve written, and will continue to be so. There is one inescapable factoid that becomes quickly obvious when reading these search terms, and that is: I am not as poor of a speller as I thought I was…by comparison. Of the many people who googled ‘system restore’, not one spelled it correctly. The folks at that outfit are doing a terrific job of not only deciphering our gibberish, but doing it in micro-seconds, and I for one am grateful for it. They sent me one spelled “sistim restro”…amazing!

Tip of the day: If you are like me and need a helping hand spelling a word every now and then you probably (like me) hailed the “built-in Spell Check utility” as the greatest thing since sliced bread. And you’ve probably learned over time (like me) that they miss far more than they catch, and cannot see the difference between they’re, there, and their, and generally aren’t much help at all. You simply won’t be doing yourself any favors if you rely on spell-check, and I don’t care whose it is.

Instead, bookmark an online dictionary like Merriam-Webster and enter your word into their search box. Unlike a real dictionary, you don’t have to know how to spell the word to find out how to spell it. Enter “sistim” and the top choice of spellings/words is “system”. It gives definitions, so you can make sure it is the word you’re thinking of. And it has a thesaurus so you can find words with the same or similar meanings. Online dictionaries are great resources, and I hope you will find them as useful and handy as I have. I couldn’t write this post without one…

Let’s just have some fun with Today’s free link: Thinks.com offers free puzzles of all sorts (crosswords, sudoku, jigsaw, etc.) and games like checkers and chess. Fit for the whole family.

*Original posting: 6/24/07

Copyright 2007-8 © Tech Paul. All rights reserved. post to jaanix

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People google the durndest things

I suppose I’m not alone in this, but I am a stat-watcher. It is a way for me to learn about you — the reader: about what topics you’re interested in and which ones you don’t bother to investigate (“you” in the broad sense). I love to get into all the statistical details, and sincerely believe that a fella cannot be presented with too many informational statistics — and I always want more. I hope Word Press brings back the Feed Stats, and does it soon.

I am fascinated by “keywords” that catch your eye: a great ‘for instance’ is that this blog is for the most part a ‘how to’ and is almost always posted in that “category”, and yet only one “view”, so far, has been linked from there. (What is that telling me???) It surprises me sometimes that my “catchiest” titles have the lowest number of views, and that I would get a lot more Google Search “hits” if I simply titled a post “System Restore”…as an example. [Now I don’t want you to think I’m ‘hit-desperate’, and would start resorting to such tricks. I’m not. Honest. But it does make one think…)

I am fascinated by which of my “Today’s free links” get used and which one’s don’t so much. It says nothing about which one is more useful than another, but it does tell me some things. For instance, apparently my readers already have anti-spyware tools or just aren’t concerned about malware, yet a large number just as apparently delete files they’ld like to get back. Curious. At least to me it is.

But the most interesting statistic is the Search Engine Links, which shows not only how many people found my article via a search on Google (Yes. I know. There are more engines than just Google.) but what words they used in their searches. These “search terms” have been the source of ideas for posts I’ve written, and will continue to be so. There is one inescapable factoid that becomes quickly obvious when reading these search terms, and that is: I am not as poor of a speller as I thought I was…by comparison. Of the many people who googled ‘system restore’, not one spelled it correctly. The folks at that outfit are doing a terrific job of not only deciphering our gibberish, but doing it in micro-seconds, and I for one am grateful for it. They sent me one spelled “sistim restro”…amazing!

Tip of the day: If you are like me and need a helping hand spelling a word every now and then you probably (like me) hailed the “built-in Spell Check utility” as the greatest thing since sliced bread. And you’ve probably learned over time (like me) that they miss far more than they catch, and cannot see the difference between they’re, there, and their, and generally aren’t much help at all. The one here on WordPress is terrible. You simply won’t be doing yourself any favors if you rely on spell-check, and I don’t care whose it is.

Instead, bookmark an online dictionary like Merriam-Webster and enter your word into their search box. Unlike a real dictionary, you don’t have to know how to spell the word to find out how to spell it. Enter “sistim” and the top choice of spellings/words is “system”. It gives definitions, so you can make sure it is the word you’re thinking of. And it has a thesaurus so you can find words with the same or similar meanings. Online dictionaries are great resources, and I hope you will find them as useful and handy as I have. I couldn’t write this post without one…

Let’s just have some fun with Today’s free link: Thinks.com offers free puzzles of all sorts (crosswords, soduku, jigsaw, etc.) and games like checkers and chess. Fit for the whole family.

Copyright © 2007 Tech Paul. All rights reserved.

 

 

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