Proofreading & Copyediting—Are Microsoft's Proofing Tools Any Good?

We've received a number of e-mails from people who are actively pursuing careers, full-time and part-time, as proofreaders and copyeditors. It's challenging and rewarding work. It sharpens your writing skills, provides a valuable service to other writers, and you can often work in your own home-office. Recently, we received a particularly interesting e-mail from Marge O'Brien, a regular reader of Kickstartnews reviews. She's been suitably challenged by a late start in the proofing and copyediting dodge and wrote to us in the hope of receiving some advice and direction. Here's what we told her. We think it's solid advice for anyone who is thinking about getting into writing and editing and for anyone already in it but looking for some help and support. More . . .

Kickstartnews Revue - Podcast #20 - Show Notes for September 25, 2005

Here's the lineup for show #20:

• Letters to the Editor: We picked out three e-mails this week - questions about dead & dying hard drives (oh dear!), somebody who wants to try and return some software they're not happy with, and a SystemSuite 6 user who is not a happy camper;
  
• Kickstartnews Confab: All about entertaining existing and prospective clients. How much is too much and when is even a little bit uncalled for. Be careful—it can be an expensive merry-go-round that's hard to get off;
  
• The Big City Byte: We've been running some great interviews over the past few shows, but Howard has some things he needs to say. The rant this week is all about upgrading. Or rather, Howard asks the question, do you reallyneed to upgrade everything the split second a new version is released? The smart money says no, and, well, stick around and hear him out.

Here are the rest of the Show Notes . . .

Can Your Web Site (and its content) Be Found?

Chasing the Search Engines’ Algorithms . . . Should you or Shouldn’t you?

By Robin Nobles

It’s a common occurrence. SEOs often spend countless hours trying to “break” a search engine’s algorithm.

“If I could just crack Google’s algo, my pages would soar to the top of the rankings!”

Let’s look at some flaws in this way of thinking.

1. Picture the Google engineers and tech folks turning the algo dial as soon as you “think” you have “cracked” the algo. Your rankings may fall, and you would have to figure out what’s working with the engine right now. In other words, your rankings may never be long term. More . . .

Kickstartnews Revue - Podcast #19 - Show Notes for September 18, 2005

Here's the lineup for show #19:

• Letters to the Editor: We picked out three e-mails this week—questions about Power Director 4, Norton Antivirus and the Cold Heat soldering iron;
  
• Kickstartnews Confab: Licensing and registering your small business—it's more important than just bending backwards to accommodate government red tape;
  
• Kickstartnews Interview: Howard sat down with well-known graphic designer and imageer Mario Georgiou of Georgiou Digital Imaging & Design, to talk about how home-office and small business should go about designing and developing logos and marketing materials.

Here are the rest of the Show Notes . . .

Kickstartnews Revue - Podcast #18 - Show Notes for September 11, 2005

Here's the lineup for show #18:

• Letters to the Editor: We answer four reader e-mails this week - questions about DVD burning, desktop printing problems, large format printing, and backup tape drive units;
• Kickstartnews Confab: How to catch lots and lots of phish - it's NOT what you think;
• Kickstartnews Interview: Howard sat down with Paul Rochford for an energetic and animated conversation about meetup groups and about how computer user groups - the places where home-office and small business owners can get truly valuable local technology and computer and software support - are very much alive and doing as well as ever.

Here are the rest of the Show Notes . . .

Kickstartnews Revue - Podcast #17 - Show Notes for September 4, 2005

Here's the lineup for show #17:

• Letters to the Editor: Time for two e-mails this week - questions about the HP 1320n laser printer and a compatibility issue with the Belkin Media Reader for iPod;
• Kickstartnews Confab: A scary, true story about small business embezzlement;
  
• Kickstartnews Interview: We cornered Judi Tyabji-Wilson, James Mogan and Jonathan Lyster at Tugboat Enterprises, the gang who design, develop and market the superb Lifeboat data recovery software. It's an upbeat, informative interview with the key people at a small, up & coming software company.

Here are the rest of the Show Notes . . .

Insurance Against Data Loss? Can You Get It?

Sallie Goetsch who among other things operates the FileSlinger(TM) Backup Blog wrote to us about some of our recent podcast comments on data loss insurance and backups:

"I've recently started listening to your podcast. It's great to hear something targeted at my own client base, the small and home office user. I write a weekly e-zine/blog about backing up your computer, so I was naturally intrigued when you talked about insurance companies requiring appropriate security hardware and backup systems before they would cover data loss. I asked a colleague who does risk management consulting about this, and he said that most ordinary business, liability, and Errors & Omissions (E&O) policies won't cover data loss at all, and what a person would need is special media insurance. I've done some preliminary research on that topic, but given Howard's very emphatic statements, I thought I should ask for the source of your information."

Your (risk management) colleague is absolutely correct Sallie — in California and New York. Underwriters have simply been loaded with too many claimed losses in those two states. Elsewhere in the U.S. however, media insurance equates with data loss coverage in many instances. There are many variants. More . . .