So, I’m wondering now whether it is better to write as yourself instead of having a publication on…

So, I’m wondering now whether it is better to write as yourself instead of having a publication on Medium?

In the new app UI I see many publications titles and to be honest I don’t really want to read them, I’m more interested in seeing an article written by a person as supposed to written in a publication.

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How I managed to uncover Google’s ineptitude

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Google is a 1.5 Trillion company whose share price is at an all-time high and whose CEO gets paid $4 million per year with 135,000 full-time employees worldwide.

I have been so disappointed with the amount of spam I receive via Google’s servers without them intercepting them.

In December 2016, I opened a G-Suite Google account, which has recently been renamed as Google Workspace [2020]. I wanted to do this in order to have it speak to a CRM account I had at the time and also for it to speak to an online calendar booking app. A lot of apps these days give preference to Google when adopting integrations. I only wanted one email address, my business one and one calendar a simple solution, but still it would cost me a handsome price of £3.30 per month (£39.60 per year). 3 years later in May 2019 it increased to £4.14 per month (£49.60 per year) and then in October 2020 to £4.60 ( £55.20 per year).

This is a 40% increase in 4 years of using the service. Not only is this abusive, it’s also scandalous and unacceptable considering we’re going through a pandemic and quite frankly business is tough.

My domain, which is with Hover.com has provided me with a small mailbox for just $20 or £11.00 per year, a saving of £44.20 or 80%!

What is Web Accessibility?

For the past few weeks I have been attending a digital marketing tweet chat on Twitter, #ElevateChat. The chat is hosted by Sarah Clarke of Dufferin Media and she does an amazing job in asking great and challenging questions to all who participate.

This week I found the toughest one yet, the topic was about web accessibility, something I know almost nothing about.

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Being courageous

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The past year has been tough for everyone on the planet and as such I have tried to be quiet, considered and have compassion for the world's suffering. The trouble with putting yourself last is that everyone else walks off with the handouts and that's pretty much how I feel my last year has gone.

As a micro-enterprise and a very small Ltd business, I have received no financial (COVID19) support from the UK government, not a single penny, I guess it's my own fault for listening to my accountant 15 years ago when I set up my own company to set it up as a limited, VAT registered one. There was no mention of a turnover threshold or anything like that at the time. I assure you, never during all my years of trading have I even got close to any kind of made-up threshold, which was suggested by accountants, eg. £50k profit before setting up a Ltd company. Unfortunately I have never made that kind of a profit in all my years of trading.

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Are You Storytelling Yet?

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Chapter 1 - Is Storytelling fact or fiction?

To what extent is story or storytelling currently used in events, meetings or conferences in your business?

I don’t believe storytelling is used widely as yet. There is a tendency in business to show and tell. With that I mean with the presenter or speaker usually has something to sell, their product or services and therefore they have an agenda. You can’t blame them as this is how any kind of presenting is mostly done, we are conditioned by examples and training in society. When I create whiteboard animation videos for my clients, I often have to coach them and help them to prevent their tendency for using a selling narrative and instead share a story. Here is a fun video I created to explain this message in a memorable way!

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An old YouTube video is showing viral promise!

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Out of the blue I started receiving a lot of emails from YouTube advising me that someone commented on my video. This video, see below, I posted on YouTube in February 2018. At time of writing it has received nearly 35,000 views and over 95 comments so far.

I recorded a scammer calling me from India, pretending to be from BT Openreach and advising me that my equipment is faulty. In order to keep him on the phone as long as possible in order to make sure that his phone bill or the company phone bill is as high as possible, I pretend to not know much about IT and as such manage to take him down a blind alley. It usually works and often they don’t call back.

Chalkboard Thoughts — Mar 09, 2021 — Episode 15 — Clubhouse

I have been on Clubhouse since 16 February 2021. I’m grateful for the invitation to join the party but having regularly listened to maybe a dozen or so shows/clubs one thing’s is very clear to me. You do need a MASSIVE ego to participate as a host/moderator making it very difficult for those that are more humble and introverted to jump in with your own show.

What I’ve noticed about Clubhouse

iOS only at the moment folks, sorry Android I’m sure it won’t be long.

They’re in their honeymoon period. Being a disrupter and beating the biggest media (social) companies in the world means you have a starter advantage, everyone wants to join you, everyone’s after those elusive invitations, just 2 per user, wow!

Inside Clubhouse

It’s not that it’s exclusive, they are still in a start-up growth process and not ready for the onslaught of trolls and criminals. Here’s their latest blog post;

Chalkboard Thoughts — February 15, 2021 — Episode 14 — Right Mindfulness

Right Mindfulness traditionally is the seventh part of the Eightfold Path of Buddhism, but that doesn’t mean it is seventh in importance. Each part of the path supports the other seven parts, and so they should be thought of as connected in a circle or woven into a web rather than stacked in an order of progression.

I first became aware of the Eightfold Path by listening to an episode of the Ten Percent Happier Podcast with Dan Harris. His guest way Brother Pháp Dung who explained more about this.

https://www.tenpercent.com/podcast-episode/brother-phap-dung-320

I started with Right Mindfulness as although this is number 7 in the list. Don’t ask me why I am starting with that one, I guess it’s the one I am most familiar with!

Are You Seeking Redemption?

Welsh denim entrepreneur David Hieatt (david hieatt) recently tweeted this:

“Being an entrepreneur is one of the most effective personal development programs you can ever take.”

BAM!!! Ain’t that the truth!!??

The question is, why is this so?

The short answer is because to be an entrepreneur, you have to cover all the bases. You got to get everything right.

Lesson

Whilst driving my car I often listen to a podcast or a book on audible. This particular day, I was driving to the railway station to catch a train into our nearest big city, Birmingham UK, I had some meetings planned with business owners and a networking event in the evening.

“It’s because of human suffering”, says the book’s narrator. All audible books are narrated of course and this particular book was being narrated by an english speaking voice, the voice of Kris Dyer. He was obviously chosen by the authors, who are the famous Dalai Lama and the not so famous Howard C. Cutler. In the summary of this book it says and I quote, “In this unique and important book, one of the world’s great spiritual leaders offer his practical wisdom and advice on how we can overcome everyday human problems and achieve lasting happiness.”

Chalkboard Thoughts — Jan 17, 2021 — Episode 13 — NHS

To get the stats, you will have to play the video below. I was watching an episode of Andrew Marr — a news programme in the UK on a Sunday morning. Actually I had to watch it on replay, as I was late getting up. The mornings are just too damn cold for getting up!

The CEO of the UK NHS (UK National Health Service) — Simon Stevens was being interviewed about the current state of the pandemic and the impact on the NHS and it’s staff.

Chalkboard Thoughts — Jan 13, 2021 — Episode 12 — Experiment

There’s always a price for wanting to be famous. But this time he price isn’t what you were hoping for. Today you are starring in your own disaster movie, but there really is imminent danger of death and with the stats in many countries stacked against us, we really do have to run for our lives. Run away from other people, who may infect us, which may mean we could get ill and worse still we carry the infection and share it with our elderly or vulnerable relatives.

Chalkboard Thoughts — Jan 11, 2021 — Episode 11 — Reality

Reality is in our minds. If you’ve ever studied or heard about Quantum Physics (Mechanics) then you will appreciate that nothing we witness is actually real. In the world of the atom everything is but orderly, in fact it’s total chaos and what we think to be order is actually disorder. It’s therefore very logical for things to be very unrealistic and not in order at all.

However our human minds want things to be orderly, that’s what we’ve all been told at school and what our parents have taught us when we grow up. In the animal kingdom nothing is orderly at all and remember we are just animals.

Rick Snyder’s Crimes in Flint USA

I discovered Michael Moore’s podcast ‘Rumble’ over the weekend and whilst cooking soup on a Saturday morning, I listened to his latest episode, which was about Flint, Michigan USA. I didn’t realise that Michael was born in Flint. That explains why he covered it in his movie Fahrenheit 11/9 and why he’s so passionate about what’s been done to the folks who live in Flint. Well ‘exist’ more likely, because it sounds like a lot of them don’t have much of a life any longer, thanks to the Rick Snyder and his gang.

Chalkboard Thoughts — Jan 11, 2021 — Episode 10 — Predictions

During 2020 I made several predictions, albeit not publicly, and they pretty much all came true. Of course they were mainly about Covid-19, about vaccines, lockdowns and the timing of our perilous journey on planet earth.

This time I’m going to make some of my predictions public. Now, these predictions are only about the U.K., if they occur in any other country, it will be purely coincidental. Already one of the predictions will be exceeded and that’s the one about the number of Covid deaths. I predicted 100,000 deaths, but I think it will be much higher than that, more like 150,000 by the time we’re out of this. This is purely down to how the U.K. government has handled this pandemic.

The Wild Wild West — USA!

I had the idea for this cartoon on Monday 4th Jan. and eventually asked Josh to draw it yesterday, Wednesday 6th Jan. I had no idea what would happen in Washington during the vote counting on that day. This event will possibly be the most remembered shootout since 1881.

Let me describe the image. Obviously it’s Joe Biden and Donald Trump pictured at the historic US Wild West event, ‘Gunfight at the O.K. Corral’.