#craigslist-hosted images instead

[mariacallous]

This article contains descriptions of sex trafficking and abuse. Discretion is advised.

For years, nonconsensual deepfake pornography has been used to harass, silence, shame, and abuse women. Celebrities and influencers have their faces implanted into existing adult videos; men have used the technology to place “friends” into explicit videos; and boys have allegedly created “nude” images of their female classmates. However, among the ever growing harassment and abuse, deepfake creators have now, arguably, hit a new low: using videos of sex trafficking victims as the basis of the nonconsensual videos.

Over the past two months, an account on the largest deepfake sexual abuse website has posted 12 celebrity videos that are based on footage from GirlsDoPorn, a now-defunct sex trafficking operation that the US Department of Justice says its operators used to conspire and commit sex trafficking through “force, fraud, and coercion,” tricking five women—and allegedly hundreds more— into making sex videos that were subsequently posted online.

The dozen videos—which ran up to 21 minutes long and racked up tens of thousands of views before they were taken down following WIRED’s inquiry—used footage originally posted to the GirlsDoPorn website and had celebrity faces added using artificial intelligence. It appears that a startup’s face-swapping tool may have been abused to transform the videos into deepfakes, according to watermarks on the footage.

As deepfake technology has become increasingly capable of creating realistic imagery and easier to use, hundreds of websites and apps designed to create or host deepfake sexual abuse have appeared. Laws to limit the use of these tools and protect those targeted are lagging, even as the malicious use of AI has evolved to not just create new victims but to revictimize survivors.

From 2012 to 2019, the DOJ says, the creators of GirlsDoPorn worked by recruiting young women, using ads posted on Craigslist, for what they claimed were clothed modeling photo shoots. When the women responded, they were told the ads were for pornographic videos, and they were pressured into taking part, according to various lawsuits and survivor testimonies.

The individuals behind the scheme, according to the DOJ, told the women the videos would only be sold on DVDs outside of the United States and the footage would not be posted to the internet. Instead, they then posted short videoclips to online platforms, such as Pornhub, and full-length versions to their GirlsDoPorn website. The videos have circulated online since.

Multiple legal proceedings against the creators of GirlsDoPorn, people affiliated with the website, and Pornhub's parent company are ongoing or have been completed—with criminal charges being issued against several GirlsDoPorn organizers in October 2019.

Since then, 22 survivors have been awarded nearly $13 million in damages, and 402 victims were given copyright ownership of videos featuring them, making it easier to scrub them from the web. At the end of 2023, Pornhub’s parent company, Aylo Holdings, agreed to pay damages to women impacted by the sharing of the GirlsDoPorn videos.

Among those charged, Ruben Andre Garcia, a GirlsDoPorn producer and recruiter, was sentenced to 20 years in prison; Matthew Isaac Wolfe, who admitted to having a “wide range of responsibilities” at GirlsDoPorn, according to the DOJ, was sentenced to 14 years; cameraman Theodore Wilfred Gyi was sentenced to four years; and GirlsDoPorn bookkeeper Valorie Moser pleaded guilty to one charge of conspiracy to commit sex trafficking and is awaiting sentencing. Finally, in March this year, the alleged GirlsDoPorn mastermind, Michael Pratt, was extradited from Spain to the US to face charges linked to the operation. He has pleaded not guilty. In total, those involved in GirlsDoPorn have been ordered to pay more than $35 million in restitution.

Brian Holm, a managing attorney at the Holm Law Group and a longtime civil attorney for GirlsDoPorn survivors, confirmed that the videos posted to the deepfake sexual abuse website were originally from GirlsDoPorn. These include, Holm says, survivors who have been involved in the legal cases against GirlsDoPorn or against Pornhub.

“It’s a real double whammy for trafficking victims to see their videos used like this,” says Holm, adding that the videos are the tip of the iceberg. “From what I’ve seen on that site, I think there's 10 times the amount you sent me that I’ve seen on there.”

The 12 videos posted by the account seen by WIRED have received up to 15,000 views each, and several have a ‘girlsdoporn.com’ watermark on the footage. The account that posted the videos has a version of “GirlsDoPorn” as its username and included the sex trafficking site in the title of the videos.

WIRED is not naming the deepfake abuse website due to its role in spreading abusive content or the celebrities featured in the videos. The website is the largest website of its kind—hosting tens of thousands of videos and receiving millions of visitors. In April, the website blocked visitors from the UK after lawmakers in the country announced plans to make it a criminal offense to create nonconsensual explicit deepfakes.

“These creators of sexually explicit deepfakes have no regard whatsoever for the women and girls who are victims of sex trafficking and now being further abused through this deepfake sexual abuse,” says Clare McGlynn, a professor of law at Durham University, who works to counter image-based abuse.

“This website is actively choosing to share recordings of actual sexual assaults,” McGlynn says. “These are heinous acts, deliberately and knowingly causing life-shattering and life-threatening harms. The drive for profit, for fueling the trade in nonconsensual porn, knows no bounds. This shows a contempt for the rights of women and girls.”

Neither the account posting the deepfake GirlsDoPorn videos nor the site’s anonymous administrator’s replied to questions from WIRED.

At the end of March, another user on the website asked whether the GirlsDoPorn footage was allowed, saying it made them “feel sick.” They suggested some people may not know the history of GirlsDoPorn but pointed out: “This … one user clearly does tho, with branding themselves with a rape website.” A moderator replied saying they were not going to remove the videos but said if there was a “list” of videos confirmed to include sex trafficking victims they would notify the website’s administrators to take them down.

As well as the GirlsDoPorn watermark, the 12 videos hosted on the deepfake website also have a watermark of US company Akool, which offers generative AI services, including a “face-swapping” tool, to marketing professionals.

Jiajun Lu, the founder and CEO of Akool, says the company’s terms of service prohibit copyright violations, sexual and violent content, and it frequently bans accounts. “They are strictly forbidden on our platform, and we have multiple approaches to prevent it from happening, and more solutions are coming up soon,” he says. “We changed our watermarks a few months ago, and these videos might not come from our website.”

The CEO says that the company is working on new safety tools as it increases the security of its website: For instance, it is considering verifying the identity of people trying to use its face-swapping tool using face recognition, and initially the team is building more prominent warning notices about prohibited use cases.

Since 2016, Charles DeBarber, director of operations at technology firm Phoenix AI, has been undertaking the arduous task of discovering and trying to remove content from GirlsDoPorn that has been posted online. As part of Phoenix AI, this work—including building tools to automate online searches and using face recognition—has helped to remove around 60 GirlsDoPorn survivors’ footage from the web, DeBarber says.

“Not only does it open wounds of survivors already, but it's making new survivors and making new victims,” DeBarber, who has worked with GirlsDoPorn survivors for years, says of the deepfakes. The deepfake abuse website, DeBarber says, doesn’t take anything down when requests are made to it, and it is hosted by a company registered in the Seychelles.

Since deepfake sexual abuse videos appeared more than half a decade ago, those targeted by them have struggled to get them removed from the web, and US lawmakers have been slow to regulate or criminalize the abusive behavior. In many instances, including in wider cases of image-based abuse, people trying to remove abusive content from the web have had to resort to complaints made under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. According to DeBarber, it’s not enough.

“Our laws are written in a way that protects intellectual property but not survivors, and it’s very demeaning for a lot of our survivors,” he says. “These are people that were treated like a commodity, and now we have to use intellectual property law to get it down.”

[lupinwritings]

My giant fic rec list

Here is my ongoing list of fic recs! More added as I read.

* unfinished

Featuring peterick, hankcon, erasermic, leopika, and ineffable husbands

Peterick

 With The Moon In His Arms

Pete is a merman who saves Patrick’s life. 

A Little Infamy

Patrick is a solo artist who's sunk his heart and soul into a second album that's failing to chart. Obviously what he needs to bump up sales and dirty up his nice guy image is a sex scandal. His music label hire amateur porn star and aspiring poet Pete to pose as Patrick's boyfriend and together they make one intimate video destined for infamy on the internet.

Patrick falling for Pete isn't part of the plan.

The Truth About Patrick

Pete Wentz is a fashion mogul with a brand new music label who gets an earful of struggling artist Patrick Stump's demo and wants to sign him. Except when he asks to see a photo of Patrick, Patrick sends him a picture of his hot roommate Mikey Way instead.

An AU based on the movie The Truth About Cats and Dogs.

Anything by SnitchesAndTalkers

Seriously they have so many good fics so I just linked their AO3 but some of my favourites they’ve written are Christmastime In The City, Dead and Dreaming, Pretty In Punk, and The Pros and Cons of Craigslist

I Could Crush You With My Voice

Pete was in an accident at an Arma show that left him totally blind. After four months of moping around his apartment, totally depressed, he opens his window and hears Patrick singing. It's love at first listen.

I Have Forgiven Jesus

In June 1952, Father Patrick Stump is involved in a scandal so great that the Diocese of Chicago has no choice but to send him away in disgrace. He finds himself in the town of Clark, Mississippi, a town not known for its tolerance of anything other than the All American Dream.

Pete never wanted to make the move to Clark but found himself forced by lack of opportunities and the death of his father during the war. Out of work and close to out of hope, he stumbles across a card in the general store, neither he, not the writer of the card aware that what follows will alter the course of their lives irrevocably.

But the smallest towns often have the darkest secrets...

You Know, I Only Wanted Fun

It’s a Hogwarts AU

But There’s No Preparing for This

Out of absolutely everything in the Central Chicago Public Library that Patrick was proud of, the number one thing was the erotica section. Was that a weird thing to be proud of? Possibly. But everyone knows librarians are the weirdest people on the planet.

On the other hand, the one thing Patrick absolutely hated about his job was difficult patrons. And the most difficult patron in the existence of difficult patrons was Pete Wentz, a man who had a big mouth and bad opinions about Patrick’s erotica section. Patrick could happily go the rest of his career without seeing Pete Wentz ever again. Like, ever. He had a loud voice and grating jokes and Patrick hoped he’d stay far, far away this weekend when Central Chicago Public Library played host to Kingston Lewis, the best erotica writer this century.

Hankcon

All The Beds I’ve Made *

Connor, co-owner of a popular coffee shop in Detroit, has been content to bury himself in his business instead of putting himself out there.

Things change when a cantankerous lieutenant becomes a regular.

(Modern Coffee Shop AU)

Bound

Hank is the sole owner, and worker, of a quaint little cafe nestled in a quite coastal village in the far north of the UK. Nine times out of ten the weather is utterly abysmal, rolling grey clouds and rain showers most days, and his shop is hidden down a narrow cobbled back alley, but he’s somewhat of a local legend for his comfort food.

It’s during one such grim, dreary day when Connor stumbles into his cafe, and his life.

Eighteen Wheels on an Uphill Climb

Hank is going to die. He’s going to die right here in Kentucky, 53 years old, halfway to broke, and tragically sober. Survived only by a nine-year-old St. Bernard and the 31-year-old twink who delivered the fatal blow.

Erasermic

How To Take Care Of A Mummy? *

Present Mic is being a personal nurse for an injured Aizawa.

Guess the rest...

Dragon Fruit 

Being a dragon slayer is certainly a lonely and dangerous job, but someone has to do it, and Shouta Aizawa is that someone. He is a member of the Aizawa clan, after all. The job was supposed to be routine, just another dragon to kill to protect a nearby village, but the slayer's life changes forever when he meets Hizashi Yamada, a bard cursed to turn into a dragon whenever the sun rises. Really, there's only one glaring issue: Aizawa can't stand bards.

Hizashi doesn't deserve this curse - at least he thinks he doesn't. How's he supposed to live out a normal life of playing music and seducing women when he has horns and a tail? And that's only during the night! Nevertheless, he's survived with this curse for three years now, but his time's running out. Mating season is fast approaching and if he isn't cured by spring, he'll be completely consumed by the curse. His only hope is Shouta Aizawa, the same man who has promised to destroy him should they fail. Can the two really work together and find the cure when they can't even get along, or is Hizashi doomed to succumb to the dragon's curse?

Leopika

Event Horizons series *

Living in New York City is tough for anyone, and it’s no different for Leorio Paladiknight. He’s a medical school dropout, he’s up to his ears in debt, and his best friend Pietro has been in the hospital for months. But when he meets a feisty blond barista named Kurapika on a beautiful spring afternoon, his life takes an unexpected turn. 

It’s Gonna Be a Bumpy Ride *

Leorio hated his cousin, Ging. He was a failure of a dad and couldn’t be bothered to watch his own kid for more than three minutes. It was Leorio’s turn to watch the kid now and it wasn’t like he was going to say no. Gon had no where else to go. He could at least let the teen bum on his couch for a few days.

He did not anticipate Gon’s incredible ability to talk to anyone, including his strange and stoic neighbor with the creepy quiet kid. He could have done with out the crazy clown and the gang drama but, hey, anything for family. (Plus that neighbor is cute when he’s not contemplating murderous revenge.)

The Odd Job

Amateur ghost hunter, Leorio Paladiknight, seems to put himself in quite a lot of spiritual predicaments. This leaves him at the mercy of a surly occult shop owner who might have more than just a few tricks up his sleeve.

Ineffable Husbands

Break my Cage and Spread my Wings *

Everyone called the Titanic the 'Ship of Dreams', but for Aziraphale, it was the ship of nightmares, carrying her away from her home in England, and her dreams of freedom, and towards the bleak future of her arranged marriage in America. The only spark of light in the darkness is her new and tentative friendship with the boldly intimate Crowley. 

[catrionamacleanart-blog]

Assessment Task 2

Network Technologies 

In this digital age there are countless new methods available for producing, publishing, promoting and communicating art and design work. It has never been easier to share your creativity with the world and gain recognition for your work. Below are some of the main technologies in use today. 

Online Galleries and Image Sharing

Online galleries allow photographers and individuals to share their most precious photos to as many people as they like with the simple click of a button.  Instead of expensive and cumbersome photo albums and hard copies, images are stored online and shared via links and emails.

Most people do not go through the trouble and expense of buying and building their own website. Most people find an image host and build their gallery on that platform.

The way the galleries look vary from site to site, which is great because you can compare the available options and choose the host that you like the most. Uploading to online galleries is usually a very easy process. If you can add an attachment to an email, you can upload a photo to an online gallery.

Some of the biggest players in online photo galleries are Google+ Photos, Flickr, and Imgur.

Other sites such as Instagram, Pinterest, DeviantArt offer a mix of photo sharing and social media aspects, creatives can post pictures of their work/art and gather a ‘following’ of people who enjoy what they do. 

Video File Sharing 

Video Hosting Platforms which allow users to upload, share or live stream their own videos to the Internet. These can either be for the general public to watch, or particular users on a shared network. The largest and most well known being YouTube, which boasts the most extensive collection of online video. These sites enable users to easily upload their own creations in to a shareable format and get instant feedback through the comments sections. Videos can be ‘liked’ which promotes them on main pages of some of these sites, increasing chances of further growth and opportunity. You can even monetise videos on certain sites, allowing creatives to earn for their work the more it is watched and shared throughout the online community. 

Other notable examples include sites such as Vimeo, Dailymotion and Twitch. 

Forums

An Internet forum, or message board, is an online discussion site where people can hold conversations in the form of posted messages. They differ from chat rooms in that messages are often longer than one line of text, and are at least temporarily archived. 

Started in the 1980s, Internet forums are community websites dedicated to the online exchange of information about virtually any subject you can imagine. It provides a venue where people with similar interests can discuss and debate various topics. The most notable and significant Internet forum communities have converged around topics ranging from medicine to technology, and vocations and hobbies.

Eg: Flickr, Digital Spy, Craigslist, Newgrounds, Quora, Reddit, The Student Room, Wattpad…etc. 

Blogging 

Blog posts are the fundamental aspect of a blog. They are normally public - the whole world can see it. The entries in a blog usually come from a single author. The entries in a blog are usually stream-of-consciousness, ‘diary-entry’ style posts. It can be personal, a project collaboration tool, a guide, or any means of communicating and publishing your creations and designs on the web.

Blogging is a great way to help market or promote yourself or your business, product, or service. This means you can sell something online through your blog or you can use it merely for informative purposes, to let people know what you’re about and what your offering. They usually come with comment sections under each post so readers/customers can offer feedback and start a dialogue with the author. 

Examples of popular online blogs: WordPress, Tumblr, Squarespace, Wix, Blogger…etc 

Social Media 

Thanks to the popularity of the Internet, individuals use social media tools to connect with each other online. Social media can help to improve an individual's sense of connectedness with real or online communities, and can be an effective tool for corporations and entrepreneurs. Creative businesses can use these tools to market their designs and products to connect with existing and potential customers.

This is in contrast to traditional which operates under a ‘mono-logic’ transmission model (one source to many receivers), such as a newspaper which is delivered to many subscribers, or a radio station which broadcasts the same programs to an entire city. 

Some of the most popular social media websites, with over 100 million registered users, include Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, QQ, Line…etc 

With a small amount of teaching/self-teaching and practice, all of these online technologies can be used with ease. They are designed in a way to make communication and sharing simpler and more succinct than ever before - opening up a whole new avenue of creative expression that was unavailable to us before. 

[ewkytpmv]

ewk’s Guide to Windows 98 Retrocomputing

hello all, i’ve created this post to help people that are interested in using windows 9x in the current year (i’ll be focusing mainly on windows 98 here since i have the most experience with it). my goal is to build a community of people that share the same hobby of using 90s/early 00s computers and want to help bring back the old web in a small way by making personal homepages and communicating with each other via old chat services such as aim or msn messenger. so, without further ado, here is my guide.

step 1: finding a pc

the first thing you’re gonna need to do is find an old pc (obviously). start by checking craigslist. if you can’t find anything on there try checking your local thrift stores once or twice a week for a few months before looking on ebay because their prices suck. i’ve gotten old systems that would’ve gone for hundreds on ebay for as little as $8 at thrift stores.

look for a pc from around 1998 to 2000 (identifiable by a windows 98 sticker on laptops and prebuilt desktops), these will typically run pretty fast but any pc from 1996-2000 should work. if you find one at a thrift store be sure to check to make sure it works. try to check the bios for specs.

the minimum specs of a system i would buy for windows 98 would be a cpu with a speed of around 300mhz and 32mb ram (i would recommend a 350mhz cpu and 64mb ram or better). note that you can use a system with specs lower than the minimum i gave but it won’t be fast.

if you can’t find an old system locally and you don’t want to spend tons of money on ebay you can build your own windows 98 computer using old and new parts. i honestly have no experience with building old systems though so don’t ask me about it. lol

if the pc you’re buying is a laptop be sure it has pcmcia slots. they look like this:

this slot is required in order to install a wifi card. if your laptop doesn’t have this check to see if it has an ethernet port (not to be confused with a phone jack):

you will need either a pcmcia card slot or an ethernet port in order to connect to the internet.

desktop pcs are easy because they have pci slots that you can easily install an ethernet card into

be sure to find an network card that windows 9x supports. for desktops an easy find is a 3com etherlink tx card (drivers are here). and for laptops the linksys wpc54g is cheap and easy to find as well (drivers here).

step 2: installing windows

if your pc already came with windows you can skip this step but let’s say you built your own system or upgraded the hard drive and you need to do a fresh install. in this case the first thing to do would be to grab an install disk image which you can from winworld. serial numbers are also there. i picked windows 98 second edition for you because it’s better supported and more stable.

then burn the image to a blank cd and yada yada yada, i’m sure you know how to do this. (if you don’t, here’s a tutorial)

you can chose a “typical” installation or go with a “custom” installation to select what components to install. i personally check most of the boxes except accessibility options and webtv (which sounds cool but doesn’t work anymore iirc). put in the serial number, enter the date and time and you’re done installing windows.

step 3: installing drivers

assuming you need drivers for your system, driversguide has a large archive of drivers and i personally use it. to get the drivers onto the new pc without internet you can burn them to a cd as well. make sure to set the disc “for use in a cd/dvd player” when prompted by newer versions of windows. if your driver is a .inf file instead of a .exe just right-click it, select “install” and restart.

step 4: software and services

congratulations, you have a working 90s pc! but what do you do with it? here’s a list of software to improve your experience:

updates and tweaks

Windows 98SE Service Pack 3.61 - unofficial pack of microsoft hotfixes and system software, has been updated in 2018

KernelEx 4.5.2 - system tweak that allows you to run software designed for newer versions of windows

classic internet browsers

Internet Explorer 5.5 SP2 - the last good version of internet explorer. full installation package comes with additional software (other versions available on this page as well)

Netscape Communicator 4.5 - good version of netscape i use

modern internet browsers

K-Meleon 1.5.4 - the fastest modern browser for win9x around, sadly the last version supported by windows 98 was made in 2010

SeaMonkey 2.0.14 - slower than k-meleon but slightly newer and runs under kernelex

communication

AOL Instant Messenger 5.1 (via Phoenix server) - aim lives on unofficially thanks to iwarg’s replacement server

MSN Messenger 3.0 (via Escargot server) - you can also connect to msn messenger in a similar way to the aim server. i believe version 5 also works but it requires hex editing and i haven’t tested it yet.

mo-footer 0.9.6r - mo-footer is a twitter client written for win9x/win2k by japanese programmer blackwingcat. it hasn’t been updated since 2011 but still works for basic use. setup can be a bit of a hassle if you don’t know what you’re doing so use google translate on the page

NetMeeting 3.01 - similar to skype or later versions of msn but older and uses ip adresses (please note that your ip address is visible to your contacts when using this software)

mIRC 5.41 - popular irc client

multimedia

Media Player Classic 6.4.9.1 - last version of mpc for win98, requires directx 9 (included in the service pack i linked earlier) and ffdshow (ffdshow requires windows 98 and an x686 cpu or better)

RealProducer G2 6.1 - great for making very compressed audio and video files for your webpages

Winamp 2.5e - very cool and sexy audio player

plugins here (be sure to get the flac one)

imaging

IrfanView 4.30 - image viewer since windows 9x doesn’t come with one by default

Adobe Photoshop 5.5 - it’s photoshop, need i say more?

file sharing

RFtp 0.9.7.5 - very lightweight, portable ftp client 

WinMX 3.54b4 - p2p service similar to napster (be sure to run the patch in the install directory)

TinyUpload - not software but rather a file sharing site that supports files up to 50mb and loads in almost any browser

webpage stuff + good hosting sites

Arachnophilia 2.1 - good html editor, please read the very touching about section

Microsoft FrontPage Express 2.0.2 - microsoft’s own visual webpage editor.

GEOCITIES.WS - mirror of geocities that accepts new accounts. doesn’t use ssl so pages will load in old browsers.

Yahoo! Japan Geocities - the official japanese geocities is still up but you need to make an account which involves verifying a japanese captcha. microsoft character map is your friend. (registration page is here)

Tripod - an old webspace provider similar to geocities but still exists

AngelFire - another old webpage host owned by lycos just like tripod

Neocities - a very well done reincarnation of geocities. uses ssl so old browsers will not be able to load pages. pages will load in k-meleon but the “browse” and “activity” pages will load infinitely so be sure to stop loading the page (esc key) shortly after clicking the link

helpful links

ECSIS List of Software For Windows 95

DON'S WINDOWS 98SE SOFTWARE PICKS

Completely Free Software - hosts many pieces of software for windows 9x

WinWorldPC - archive of a bunch of old software and operating systems

that’s about it for now, i’ll be updating this post from time to time. please message me if you have any questions!

[latestnews36024h]

10 Home Office Ideas That Will Make You Want to Work All Day

Whether you work from home or have carved out a space for something you love like crafting, reading, or writing, your home office is a place that should inspire the flow of creativity and allow you to get down to business. But often, that's not the case. In fact, home offices can be the most neglected spaces in our homes—messy and unfriendly environments for inspiration, driving us to work anywhere but in the actual office, like the couch, or kitchen, or bed (guilty!). To help you create and update your own inspiring space, we asked experts—from designers to bloggers and editors—for their advice on the best home office updates and small home office ideas that will make you want to buckle down and get to work.

1. Think Chic Your space should inspire you—and reflect your unique personality. So don't be afraid to go all out.“We wanted to design a space that was fashionable, functional and reflected homeowner Desi Perkins’ personality. The black accent wall added some drama and depth to the space and we added a chandelier above the desk to add a little glitz and glamour. The wood tiled sideboard keeps the space organized, serving as a storage unit for beauty products and countertop for office supplies. The functionality of the space makes it possible for Desi to stay on top of the business side of her career while the chic decor provides the perfect backdrop for her videos and Instagram photos.” — Leura Fine, CEO and Founder of Laurel & Wolf

Get The Look: One way to glam up a home office is by refreshing your lighting. This eye-catching pendant lamp with gold detailing from Target will give your space a luxurious, yet professional feel.

2. Add Green Breathe some life into your space, so you'll want to stay longer. “I try to ensure a balanced home office which is practical, ergonomic, comfortable, and clean—if these elements aren’t in place I know I’ll end up working at the kitchen table! A lovely plant is said to help keep you feeling calm and clean the air—plus it looks pretty too. I like either a Snake Plant or a ZZ plant. Both look lovely, are good for cleaning the air, and are low maintenance!” — Niki Brantmark, Author and Founder of My Scandinavian Home

Get The Look: We adore this elevated cute little clay planter—perfect home for a snake plant—to add some dimension to your work space.

3. Get Artsy Decorate with images that speak to you. Even if you're crunching numbers all day. “Fill your office with vibrant art to energize your space and make you feel motivated. I create my own artwork and have it framed by Simply Framed, or I shop from Chairish and Society6.” — Dabito, Founder & Creative Director at Old Brand New

Get The Look: Dabito is happy to share his genius DIY instructions for his multi-purpose wall shelf/desk. (They're surprisingly easy to follow, phew!) But if you don’t want to spend your Saturday spray-painting and building shelves this wall unit from Ikea is a similarly chic option that can be up and ready fast!

4. Find the Rug Ground your space with a colorful area rug—for visual interest and soothing sound-absorption. “The multi-colored rug brings in other colors that accent the peach and green nicely, too. But you could also do a neutral gray rug with this color combo. Keep the furniture simple and clean to make it more sleek, and then add in some green foliage to give the room some texture!” — Joy Cho, Founder & Creative Director of Oh Joy!

Get The Look: World Market is great for beautiful, affordable textiles, and we're loving this multi-shaded patterned rug, which works with light blue, plum, apricot, or creamy white walls.

5. Practice Hygge Make it welcoming—but not too cozy that all you want to do is nap. "Neutral colors on your walls and floor, paired with natural wood, plants and some kind of textile, like blankets, throw pillows, rugs or a yarn wall hanging, create a simple yet cozy working space.” — Caitlin & Manda, Co-founders of The Merrythought

Get The Look: This soft space-dyed throw from West Elm is just what your home office needs. Create a DIY blanket ladder, and hang a few wool ones near your desk for keeping warm in winter; switch them out with thin, cotton ones in the summer.

6. Hang a Gallery Wall It's your space—crowd it with what you love. “Style a gallery wall against a neutral wall. You can arrange them on the floor first, moving the prints around until you achieve the harmonious look that you want. Use removable wall strips to hold your prints up. This allows for the flexibility of changing the look of the wall.” — Geraldine Tan, Founder & Editor of Little Big Bell

Get The Look: We love Minted for their huge, affordable collection of prints. They also provide a free service so that you can text a picture of your wall to their stylists, and they’ll put together a recommendations of art pairings for you. Matting and frames are a way to make art prints look more expensive and styled, but can be a pricey investment. Don’t rule out Michaels—they do custom framing in store!

7. Mix Old and New Don't be afraid to steal decor from other rooms in the house. A mix of vintage and modern makes a home feel warm and lived in and personal, instead of feeling like a showroom. “We paired a gorgeous antique rug that the client already had (hidden away in a dark spot elsewhere in the house!) and a pair of new red chairs. The art on the walls is limited to black and white images so that the color in the space doesn’t become too overwhelming. It is such a comfortable, beautiful room to work in.” — Melissa Mascara, Designer at Homepolish

Get The Look: Nothing in the attic? Shop antique stores, flea markets, and even Craigslist to find pieces for your office, whether it’s an aged roll top desk or vintage lamp, and pair these with brand new items, like a pair of vibrant chairs for guests to use when you’re hosting a meeting from home.

8. Let Light in Stay connected to the great outdoors. "Natural light makes a space feel bigger—which is always a plus in a small space. For my home office I actually used fogged window film on all the windows so I could always have the blinds up. This allows enough light to feed the plants in the room and keep them, as well as myself, lively! And when you feel alive, you’re always more efficient.” — Hayley Francis, Founder and Blogger at Neon Doves

Get The Look: If you, like Hayley, have an office that also functions as a dressing room/walk-in closet, affix a non-adhesive frosted film to windows, to allow sunlight into your space while maintaining privacy.  

9. Work in Color Choose colors that speak to you—not what's trendy. “I found this Stone Blue color by Farrow & Ball provided the perfect background for a productive day’s work. Having a bit of fun with the filing cabinets in a non-conventional turquoise meant that even the more functional elements of the room looked attractive.” — Emily Murray, Founder & Editor at The Pink House

Get The Look: Whether you’re painting office walls, shelves, and ceiling with one color to make the space feel larger, or using a filing cabinet like this one from CB2 for just a pop of color, working in a color-filled environment can make you more inspired to work from your office—and not the couch.

10. Optimize Your Space Organization is key—use every trick in the book. Nobody works well in a messy home office. “Don’t waste an ounce of space by tucking printers, filing, etc into corners and in drawers. Use all your vertical space, too, by putting cabinets up to the ceiling with varying types of storage and a wall hanging pin board to help organize supplies that might otherwise end up shoved in a drawer!” — Carly Callahan, Designer at Homepolish and Founder of Callahan Interiors.

Get The Look: This is one home office decor idea that's non-negotiable! Kick off your newfound commitment to organization with this rose gold wall grid.

[tech-battery]

SAMSUNG’S ODYSSEY G9 DOES THE WORK OF THREE MONITORS

I have been a technology cheapskate most of my life. I’ve rarely bought a monitor brand-new; I’m pleased to say I pieced together my current three-screen articulating swing-arm setup primarily from Craigslist and hand-me-downs. But this fall, I had an opportunity to temporarily replace my three aging displays with the most ridiculous, most advanced gaming monitor ever made: the super-ultrawide, super-curved, ultra-high resolution 49-inch Samsung Odyssey G9.

The Samsung Odyssey G9 is a monitor so big, so wide, so curved, it can fill a midsized desk and wrap around your entire field of view. It’s also simply a phenomenal screen: speedy (240Hz, 1ms, G-Sync, and FreeSync 2), high resolution (5120 x 1440-pixel), and bursting with brilliant color thanks to a QLED panel that tops out at an eye-searing 1,000 nits of brightness. I’m not kidding when I say I have to avert my eyes when I launch Destiny 2 in HDR, and I could swear I felt the flames the first few times my Star Wars: Squadrons’ TIE Bomber blasted an X-Wing into oblivion.

As they say on Reddit, I have ascended — and the past few weeks have been a gaming and productivity experience like few I’ve had before.

But gradually, I’ve been coming back down to Earth.

DESIGN

The Odyssey G9 is a showstopper, and I don’t just mean that figuratively: last January, attendees of the world’s biggest technology show were dazzled by its unprecedented curvature and sci-fi inspired frame.

When I put that same monitor on my humble IKEA sit-stand desk, the effect is otherworldly. Compared to my old hodgepodge of screens and rat’s nest of cabling, this G9 looks like a terminal aboard a Star Trek spaceship... even if my physical keyboard and its long braided cable ruin the illusion a bit.

The sheer size of the Odyssey G9 and its broad-shouldered stand do limit your options. I’m lucky that my small-form-factor Ncase M1 can fit behind the screen, and there’s just enough clearance (a little over six inches) for my Audioengine A2+ speakers to fit underneath the monitor at the stand’s highest position. But if I had a bigger PC or bigger speakers, I might have also needed a bigger desk — or else had to use the included 100mm x 100mm VESA adapter to mount the nearly four-feet wide, one-foot deep, 31-pound screen to the wall. My current monitor arms can’t carry nearly that much weight, though you can buy some TV arms that do.

As it is, I’m a fan of the way this monitor brings my whole desk together. Two DisplayPorts and an HDMI 2.0 port let me switch between three video sources easily, including a side-by-side mode which lets me display two at once, effectively giving my PC and game console (or a second computer) each their own 24.5-inch, 2560 x 1440 displays.

There’s also a two-port USB-A 3.0 hub and a 3.5mm audio output, which worked perfectly with my keyboard’s USB and 3.5mm audio passthrough. As you can see from my photos, I can do a lot with only a single visible cable thanks to those ports. And while the narrow V-shaped stand might seem a little minimal for a monitor this hefty, it takes a decent shove to get it to tip forward even at its highest position.

You can adjust the monitor’s settings using a tiny five-way control nub underneath the power LED, and it’s remarkable how much you can tweak — including the ability to crop the entire panel to 4:3, 16:9, or 21:9 aspect ratios instead of stretching out the image. You can effectively have a 27-inch HDR panel for your game console or TV whenever you need. It’s just a shame that the monitor’s biggest benefits don’t necessarily translate to its side-by-side mode, where your 240Hz HDR screen generally becomes a pair of 60Hz SDR ones.

PRODUCTIVITY

My first big test for Samsung’s Odyssey G9 wasn’t a console or even PC gaming — last month, I co-hosted The Verge’s industry-famous Apple event live blog, capturing every screenshot you saw. I normally run three monitors because I switch tasks like mad, and if there’s a better multitasking test than an Apple event, I haven’t met it yet.

At first, I wasn’t sure this epic screen would work. Most apps and websites aren’t designed to display across the vast expanse of a single 32:9 monitor, so you have to live in windows. I couldn’t simply toss one or two apps onto each monitor like I usually do. But while Samsung doesn’t ship the G9 with any good windowing software and Windows 10’s default Snap is woefully insufficient, Microsoft’s free downloadable FancyZones windowing manager worked wonders.

l built my own set of dedicated snappable spots for the Apple live stream; The Verge’s live-blogging tool; Slack; a browser window to keep track of any Apple press releases that might pop during the show; and even a narrow strip of Windows Explorer so I could see which images I’d already captured and weed them out as necessary. The only other wrinkle was the additional Chrome extension I had to download to ensure YouTube could launch “full screen” in a browser window, instead of taking over my entire ultrawide monitor.

In general, while I did occasionally miss my two vertically oriented monitors for scrolling long webpages, Google Docs, and Tweetdeck, I found the G9’s gigantic horizontal expanse of real estate nearly as effective for most tasks. Where I could only squeeze four narrow columns of Tweetdeck onto my old portrait-orientation screens, the G9 would comfortably fit five, plus a 30-tab web browser, a nice vertical strip of Evernote for note-taking, and our Slack newsroom alongside.

I wouldn’t say it’s better than having three screens for work, but it seems like a sufficient substitute — except maybe that toast notifications now pop up in the corner of my eye where they’re pretty easy to miss. Still, it’s nice not to have to match color, contrast, and brightness across three screens at a time, or adjust how my mouse crosses from one monitor to the next. Having a single, vast, unbroken expanse of real estate that’s always the same distance from my face (as I spin in my chair) is an absolute treat. And while the Odyssey G9’s unprecedented curve does tend to catch ambient light, the matte screen does a great job of diffusing any glare.

The ultrawide aspect ratio didn’t work as well for video as I hoped, though. While you might imagine 32:9 being great for movies, I had a hard time finding anything I could play in ultra high definition that wasn’t 16:9. Most streaming platforms won’t easily let you access their 4K and HDR content on a Windows machine to begin with — YouTube’s the primary exception, though Netflix works if you’ve got a recent Intel processor and use Microsoft Edge or the native app — and you’ll want 4K to take advantage of a screen this high-res and this close to your face. The 4K YouTube videos I played were definitely clearer than 1080p — I could really peep these pixels in Dieter’s iPhone 12 video review. And while standard 16:9, 1080p content does display just fine full-screen with black borders on the sides, it feels like I’m wasting a lot of screen real estate that way. Plus, the blacks are a bit gray, not the deep inky black you’d get from an OLED screen — particularly with HDR on and Samsung’s iffy local dimming enabled.

GAMING

The first thing you should know about gaming on the Odyssey G9 is that you’ll want a serious graphics card to go with it. Technically, 5120 x 1440 resolution isn’t quite as many pixels as a 3840 x 2160 4K UHD screen... but remember we’re also talking about a monitor that goes up to 240Hz. To properly review the Odyssey G9, I borrowed an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 to get enough horsepower, since my GTX 1080 couldn’t even run games like Death Stranding or Destiny 2 at 60fps smoothly at that resolution.

The second thing you should know about gaming on the Odyssey G9 is that it may not be quite as immersive as you’re imagining.

Don’t get me wrong: having an X-Wing cockpit wrapped all around you is an epic experience, and it feels like a true advantage to be able to use my peripheral vision in competitive shooters like PUBG and CS:GO. But it wasn’t long until I noticed something weird going on.

Look carefully at these images: notice how the sides are warped? Imperial deck officers and Novigrad Temple Guards aren’t generally this pudgy.

I tried game after game after game on the Odyssey G9, digging into my Steam, Epic, and Uplay libraries and tweaking a variety of settings, and this is simply the reality: every 3D game gets warped when you’re viewing it in a 32:9 aspect ratio, and there’s not much you can do about it. Changing your field of view in a game doesn’t get rid of the effect; it simply changes how much of the game world appears in the center of your screen (where things look normal) and at the edges (where they look stretched and zoomed). I actually pulled out a tape measure and checked: video game content that measures 4.75 inches at the center of the display can get stretched to a full 12 inches at the edges.

Now, this isn’t Samsung’s fault; it’s just the way games are built. Most games have a single virtual camera that exists at a single point in space, and while Nvidia once proposed changing that (see link above), the company’s Simultaneous Multi-Projection doesn’t seem to have made it into any of the games I tested. And in games with pre-rendered cutscenes, like Final Fantasy XV, you’ll be watching them at their original aspect ratio.

But before you write off 32:9 ultrawides right now, there are three things I’d like you to consider:

You might get used to it.

It’s not that distracting in some games!

2D games aren’t affected at all.

Let me give you some examples.

CS:GO and PUBG are incredibly competitive, nail-biting games where focus is everything, where you always need to have your gun at the ready and be scanning for any sign of movement. I don’t have time to turn my head left and right to appreciate the scenery or think about whether it’s warped. The G9 simply gives me enhanced peripheral vision, and it helps — not hurts — that things which appear in the corner of my eye are zoomed in by default. I got used to treating it as my peripheral vision and nothing else. (The 240Hz also comes in pretty handy in games like CS:GO where you can actually hit that frame rate.)

Genshin Impact, Abzû, Rocket League, and BioShock Infinite are games with gorgeous, colorful worlds whose proportions aren’t “normal” to begin with, and I love having them wrapped around me.

In Destiny 2 and XCOM 2, I found I could forgive the warping because of the enhanced field of view and the ability to easily zoom whenever you want. It’s nice to see more of the battlefield at once in XCOM while planning out how my soldiers will move each turn, and it’s pretty cool to aim down the sights in Destiny without the typical claustrophobia that comes with zooming in, since you’re still able to see what’s going on around you.

2D / 2.5D games like Worms W.M.D and Disco Elysium do look fantastic on the G9 — when you can find ones that actually support an ultrawide screen. That’s not a given: I managed to launch Soldat at 5120 x 1440 resolution, but it didn’t stretch across my monitor. Games with fixed widths like Streets of Rage 4 and Hyper Light Drifter won’t either. Even Disco Elysium only offers 21:9 support, not 32:9, unless you apply a hack.

And for every one of the 3D games that worked, I also found a Borderlands 3 or The Witness or Goat of Duty or The Witcher 3 where the warped geometry really bugged me, either because I wanted to sit back and look at the beautiful vista or because the edges of my screen were moving faster than the center.

In games like the hack-and-slash Mordhau or the road-tripping Final Fantasy XV, the distraction can also be when a piece of geometry that’s critical to the game constantly looks wrong. (Your Mordhau sword or axe often extends into the warped area of the screen; the road itself in FFXV looks curved instead of flat!)

Frankly, the most annoying game I played on the Odyssey G9 was figuring out which games would work in the first place. Here, I have to shout out Rock Paper Shotgun’s Katharine Castle, whose brilliant example-filled guide showcases nearly three dozen titles that do work, complete with GIFs so you can see for yourself. But if you’re willing to work at it (and understand the risks), a community at the Widescreen Gaming Forum (WSGF) and PCGamingWiki can help you hack and patch many existing titles to work at 32:9, too.

For instance, I installed a trainer that let me run Death Stranding at full-resolution 32:9, with an infinitely adjustable field of view, instead of the 21:9 that designer Hideo Kojima and company shipped.

Using a common tutorial, I hex-edited my Persona 4 Golden .exe and remarkably wound up playing what was originally a 480p PlayStation 2 game — and later a 720p, 16:9 PlayStation Vita game — at a glorious 3840 x 1080 at 32:9. (I do still need to figure out how to un-stretch the UI.) And there’s an old, unmaintained program called Widescreen Fixer that helped me revisit an old favorite:

I wouldn’t say the community is robust enough that you could necessarily find a fix for any game in your library. But the WSGF does now have a Discord you might want to check out.

THE ULTIMATE ULTRAWIDE, BUT THE BEST MONITOR?

The Samsung Odyssey G9 costs $1,479.99 — a premium price for a premium monitor like nothing else on the market. You can find other 49-inch 32:9 panels for less, but none with this combination of resolution, brightness, curvature, and refresh rate. The closest you can come is last year’s $1,200 Samsung CRG9 which maintains the resolution and brightness but with half the refresh rate at 120Hz and a notably less pronounced 1800R curvature — which, I imagine, wouldn’t be as good at giving you convincing peripheral vision in games.

If you’re looking for the ultimate ultrawide, this is currently it. I’m just not convinced that I am, personally, even if I had that much money earmarked for a new screen. For $1,500 and the enormous amount of space the Odyssey G9 consumes, I could buy a 48-inch LG OLED TV instead. I’d get a screen just as gigantic for my multitasking, but taller, with 120Hz G-Sync and FreeSync support, incredibly deep blacks, HDMI 2.1 for variable refresh rate for the PS5 and Xbox Series X, and no need to troubleshoot aspect ratios for my videos and games. Linus Tech Tips has a video that dives deep into the pros and cons of that LG screen, and I came away fairly convinced.

It wouldn’t be the same experience that the G9 offers, of course, and I might regret it if Nvidia and AMD ever dust off Simultaneous Multi-Projection for real. The TV might also cut off access to a large portion of my desk, and I might not be able to place my PC and speakers within easy reach without blocking a bit of the screen. But I’d have a more obviously future-proof setup; an equally, if not more gorgeous image; and a lot less ambient annoyance when I want to game. At the very least, here’s hoping Samsung adds HDMI 2.1 to this epic monitor next year.

[suzannaalden2]

How To Submit To A Deep Link Directory

By merely opening an email to read it, you tell the spammer you study the e-mail. There is e-mail checking software program that can tell an emailer if an e-mail was opened or not. By opening the email, you have informed the spammer your e-mail deal with is energetic, this is an e-mail account you actually check, and you are relatively intrigued in this topic. This will get you added to their spam lists. SEOmoz Linkscape is a backlink tracking tool that offers a free edition. You can check out the free and improve later on if you like. SEOmoz Linkscape allows you to track distinctive links that you get to each web page of your web site. You can also monitor the web page rank of each web page and of the general domain. The paid out version allows you to evaluate your rivals web sites as nicely. SEOmoz Linkscape allows you to monitor a number of useful metrics of your competitors this kind of as the number of links, the quality of the links, and the GSA verified list key phrases that they are focusing on, all of which is very useful applied to your own campaign. The initial factor you require to do in such a situation is verify to see if there are any logical reasons for this spike. For example, was there some media coverage on your industry that would trigger an improve in queries for your keywords? There can be perfectly affordable explanations for sudden traffic spikes. Did you encounter an improve in sales? This is another great indicator of genuine traffic. If your revenue correspond to your GSA verified list visitors every thing should be fine. "Yahoo answers" is yet another way to find solutions for link developing concerns. If you have a link building question, you can ask your question looking for an answer. At the same time you can solution some of the concerns there to address your link building question. When you signal up for online groups like discussion boards, chat rooms, newsgroups and dialogue teams, your email deal with is usually noticeable somewhere. Both as part of your profile, or when you post. Frequently the complete member list is accessible to anybody who is a member. So if a spammer signs up for 1 of these teams they can get your email address and add it to their spam GSA Verified List. If you use on-line teams, sign up for a totally free e-mail account (Gmail, Yahoo mail, Hot mail, and so on) that you only use for these teams. Other benefits are: no leftovers, you can change or include products effortlessly and immediately, and no restrictions as to what you can promote. Furthermore, you get to use your customers' money to run your company and "carry" brand name-title goods and look large. Is this cool or what? Using that method you could avoid you getting to spend for a hosting account. You just use the facility of having AWeber host your optin form which is develop inside AWeber. this is then send directly to an affiliate offer. The link that you deliver people for optin is the URL for the optin file that you loaded into Dropbox. You ought to mask this link using a link shortener like bitly or small.cc or else people will see that you are utilizing GSA verified list community Dropbox information which they could access straight. Affiliate incentives can consider numerous various forms, from special reports to ebooks to totally free coaching. When you use them you can be certain that individuals will buy from your affiliate link instead of other people. 41. Established up your store on Fb, Orkut, Twitter and other social networking or weblog websites. Show your goods, merchandise of the day, question of the week and prizes, GSA verified list etc. Consider part in discussions and queries. Promote your Encounter/Featured Product by presenting it in an extraordinary and interest-grabbing method. Display them on various pages like recommendation, item critiques, clearance locations, coupons and featured products sections. Last but not minimum, find three to 5 energetic forums in your niche and begin participating. You want to make certain that these are energetic forums. There should be at minimum ten posts a day if the forum is really GSA verified list active and has a faithful readership. Sign up for the discussion boards. Make sure you consist of your image and fill out your profile. A lot of them also allow you to create a link back to your blog. The fight for Craigslist still rages on, who will get? No 1 knows. Will Craigslist discover something that functions? No 1 sure, but if it doesn't you can be certain; this could very well be the finish of Craigslist. At that stage will be the next target? Kijiji? Perhaps Backpage? Only the spammers know. URL Ranker offers instant, online reports of web site rankings in seventeen leading search engines, such as Google, Yahoo, AOL Lookup, MSN, AllTheWeb and AltaVista, again for totally free. It will tell you if your site is GSA verified list in every engine, and tell you the rating if it is. If you write useful comments, the visitors of the blog will be much more inclined to click on on your name and read your blog to discover more about you. This provides you an opportunity to signal up for you list if you have an opt-in box on the sidebar of your blog.

[allianceinternational-blog]

Accounting Recruitment Agencies - Accountant Jobs - Tips On Finding Be Employed In Accounting

By : Yogita Yadav

Image Source :

As Agio is looking for a future-proof solution to manage learning and talent, we guided them through the actual learning landscape. 

 Video Source:

He gives insight into if the results mirror the demand for accounting staff that Robert Half consultants are seeing on the ground. 

 Accountancy Recruitment Agencies - Findings Jobs On Craigslist - The Way To Search With Success

 Evaluate your positives and negatives and seek efficient on along with them to your benefit. Recognize yourself best and so it is completely essential which you're employed basic facts in mental.

 Finance jobs can be rather exciting although, and looking on the bright side of computer - anyway it pays well. Jobs in Bank Industries happen to known shell out over 6 digits 30 days and perhaps even more than that. But this aren't required to always be. Jobs in Banking is just as diversified plus there is types and categories of jobs ,Top Accountant Recruitment Agencies within the market - well maybe not too many, anyone get the particular.

 More people are starting their very own businesses. With so many hire accountants on a part-time basis as calls for not enough work to have full-time scenario. You can use once or twice from a week and do the duties that must be be completed by you.

 Not following up. You need to your resume out there but perform checking that it really got to where it needed to see. In a survey on accounting recruitment conducted by Robert Half International in 2006, 82% for this executives had said that "Candidates should contact hiring managers within a fortnight of submitting application materials*." Email is the foremost way get in touch with the hiring manager, associated with the phone, according to your survey.

 After graduating from college or University, do not rest onto your laurels and wait possibilities to come calling because this is not likely to happen. Instead, take a proactive step and hunt down companies that you might want to work with and are jealous of. For starters, find out the regarding people your number one employer likes to hire. When you have impressive IT skills, create a short video sketch of one's work, these types of highlight the necessary strong points, and send it to potential business employers.

 Using the hosted sort, your ecommerce software is acquired from any third party server. Usually somehow less expensive than inhouse having said that come at a price . Very often, alter or personalize the control sets people types of ecommerce software opportunities. Where by inhouse kinds have the nice thing about tweaking individual preferances, the only thing is your costs for maintaining private gets higher along with your sales.

 If have got experience in the legal field, you might even consider freelance legal projects. There is a great deal of legal accounting that can really use assist in. There are people who may hire an individual counsel them, to help them prepare paperwork and whole lot. Depending on what your legal specialist is, expert a great help to individuals and companies working for a freelance legal specialist.

 2) Postal Service Accountants: Postal services are spread over earth. It your of item networks in fact. The service keeps looking for accountants now and again. The pay is usually good you will be very satisfied working as being a postal service accountant.

 Although can't control the economy, actually have functions to be an aggressive job seeker. By acting and preparing your work search now, you can have the edge against your competitors in having the job an individual always imagined having next year.

 It pays well if your company is dealing with popular associated with accounting such as auditing procedures and "forensic accounting". Have got acquired huge demand especially with the increase of fraudulent activities in the field of accounting.

 If an individual experience in accounting, specialists . have a bigger chance of finding a part in virtual accounting. Happen to be many internet business accounting recruitment you to take a look at. The extent among the job will be based on the company you are earning a living for and the particular reason why.

 6) Bookkeepers: Do not get confused about the role of a bookkeeper. Their job centres on maintaining accurate records of financial data. This may range from info onpayment, income, sales and pick.

 Yes, it hurts staying rejected but there a number of open doors to get busy with compared to staring in the closed single. Take this as a challenge to be more responsible. Take a step and also examine your job search resource. Find out if your resume is updated, or if it focuses more around the strengths, skills and internship success instead of lists of awards or degrees to be able to accomplished. Additionally you need enhance your interview skills. May do practice talking in front of the mirror and listen to for yourself how confident you possess been in answering common job interview questions.

 Take your accounting internship very seriously. Remember that, not only takes you into the impression of area you are about collection your foot in, furthermore will give you with a tremendously helpful work past experience. Try to get contacts and make priorities for a social network to develop the best of each chance doable.

 2) Postal Service Accountants: Postal services are spread over entire world. It your of obviously networks of them all. The service keeps looking for accountants from time to time. The pay is usually good may will be very satisfied working as being a postal service accountant.

 But finances are not the one thing associated with accounting job. You might find it strange, another thing because accounting professionals have to endure money indicates. But this profession is not just about handling others' money.

 Address :B-707 MONDEAL SQUARE 

Sarkhej – Gandhinagar Hwy, 

Prahlad Nagar, 

Ahmedabad, 

Gujarat 380015

Mobile no.:-+91 9898434323

For More Information: https://www.allianceinternational.co.in

[jobsearchtips02]

Three months into the pandemic, price gouging is still a real problem

Hand sanitizer remains one of the most sought-after items of 2020 and one of main targets of price gougers.

Nicholas Kamm/AFP via Getty Images

We’re three months into the pandemic, but it’s still easy to find examples of price gouging on Amazon. Last Friday, within five minutes, CNET found Cottonelle toilet paper listed on Amazon for $57.42 (price for the same item on Target: $21.49), and a two-pack of 28-ounce jars of Rao’s marinara sauce for $29.04 (an adjacent listing of 24-ounce jars from Amazon-owned Whole Foods would cost you $10.78).

The problem isn’t confined to Amazon’s massive digital storefront. It’s pretty much everywhere.

By early June, Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro’s office received 5,000 complaints about price gouging during the pandemic. That’s compared with about 27,000 consumer complaints on all topics that his office typically receives in a whole year.

“To get 5,000 in basically what’s been two months on one specific topic is extraordinary,” Shapiro said in an interview.

His office is part of a growing effort by authorities and major retailers to tamp down price gouging, as complaints have spiked in recent months. These organizations can point to thousands of wins to prevent this practice, with attorneys general sending out mountains of successful cease-and-desist orders and Amazon suspending more than 6,000 seller accounts.

Read: COVID-19 surcharge: Why you’re seeing extra fees on your bill  

Last Friday, a search for “Rao’s Homemade Marinara Tomato Sauce” found a seller listing a two-pack for nearly $30 right next to a Whole Foods listing that would cost consumers just a third of that for essentially the same product.

Screenshot from Amazon

But toilet paper and marinara sauce listings show that while efforts to curb price gouging have had an impact, consumers can still run into problems. Retailers like Amazon and eBay will need to stay focused on pricing to keep their customers’ trust and ensure they aren’t caught flat-footed the next time there’s a supply shortage or emergency situation. Consumers, meanwhile, will have to stay vigilant, since price gougers keep changing their tactics to follow surges in demand during the pandemic.

“While there’s been a lot of progress, it was so egregious early on — like in the end of February, March, April — that while it’s better now it’s still really disappointing,” said Ryan Stark, co-founder and chief product officer of Popcart, which provides a price tracking tool for consumers. “I definitely think the platforms, you know, the Amazons, the eBays, the Walmarts of the world can do a lot more here.”

A $250 hand sanitizer bottle on Craigslist

Price gouging isn’t a new problem, but it’s one that’s become more widespread and troublesome during the coronavirus pandemic since some sellers will sharply raise prices on items that are needed for safety, like hand sanitizers, or for the inevitable, like toilet paper. The issue is also especially problematic with tens of millions of people out of work and trying to stretch every dollar on essential goods.

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In the early days of the pandemic in February and March, prices for face masks, toilet paper, sanitizer and wipes spiked amid a rush by consumers to stock up ahead of stay-at-home orders. Plenty of sellers took advantage by raising prices, and platforms like Amazon and eBay struggled with a flood of listings of overpriced goods. US PIRG, a nonprofit consumer watchdog, came out with a study in early March highlighting the problem. It found prices spiked for most of the 100 items it reviewed on Amazon by more than 50%, with price rises for face masks and hand sanitizers sold directly by Amazon itself and by third-party merchants on its site.

In response to the US PIRG report, an Amazon spokeswoman said that when the company sees an error, “we work quickly to fix it.”

In late March, mentioning the US PIRG report, a group of 33 state attorneys general, co-led by Shapiro, called on Amazon, Facebook, eBay, Walmart and Craigslist to do a better job tamping down price gouging. They cited a two-liter bottle of hand sanitizer on Craigslist for $250 and packs of face masks on eBay for $40 to $50. 

Stark, from Popcart, said price gouging has continued to migrate to new areas to follow consumer demand. It started in paper goods and cleaners, but price gougers have now made their way to work-from-home categories like webcams and to summer recreation equipment like inflatable swimming pools, which are in high demand amid stay-at-home orders. He added that price gougers have also figured out new methods, like hiding extra fees in the shipping cost, which can fool e-commerce companies’ automated systems.

In another situation, The Verge found sellers listing common items as “collectibles” to avoid price gouging monitors. Early into the pandemic, there were serious problems with hoarding, including a now-famous example of two Tennessee brothers buying up 17,000 bottles of hand sanitizer from local stores and trying to flip them for profit on Amazon. Amid a public backlash, they donated their supplies and reached a settlement with the state attorney general to avoid prosecution and a fine.

Coronavirus reopenings: How it looks as lockdowns ease around the world

See all photos

To avoid price gouging, Stark suggested people do at least one price comparison before buying online to confirm the cost isn’t inflated. That can be done using Popcart, CamelCamelCamel or Keepa, or just checking another major retailer’s website. Also, while sites like Amazon, which host millions of independent merchants, have struggled to contain price gouging, traditional retailers that don’t have big third-party marketplaces haven’t faced the same problem, Stark said, so shopping with Kohl’s or Target could help avoid some of these problems.

Checking per-unit prices also help to compare costs for slightly different sized items, like a 20-ounce jar of peanut butter versus a 32-ounce jar.

Fines, cease-and-desist orders, and calls for new laws

The group of attorneys general has called on major retailers to do more monitoring of price hikes on their sites and provide a place for consumers to complain about price gouging. Shapiro said this effort has prompted Amazon to refer more price gouging problems to law enforcement and track its pricing more closely, which he said has resulted in a marked improvement. 

Attorneys general, he said, also got 3M more involved in preventing price gouging of the masks it makes. This month, the company sued a merchant selling its masks on Amazon for 18 times their list price: $23.21 each instead of $1.25.

Amazon said it’s started more manual audits of products to catch price gougers who work to evade its automated systems. The company is also working directly with attorneys general in 10 states on this issue.

“There is no place for price gouging on Amazon, and that’s why our teams are monitoring our store 24/7 and have already removed more than half a million offers for attempted price gouging,” the Amazon spokeswoman said in a statement. “We are disappointed that bad actors are attempting to take advantage of this global health crisis and have also suspended more than 6,000 selling accounts for violating our fair pricing policies and referred hundreds of the most egregious bad actors to law enforcement.”

Looking to future emergencies, Amazon in May called on Congress to pass national standards for price gouging laws, since the current patchwork of state laws is hard for retailers to navigate. Amazon mentioned that two-thirds of states prohibit price gouging only during times of crisis, like an official state of emergency, and the definition for price gouging can vary, defined as a 10% hike in California or an  “unconscionably excessive” price increase in New York.

Now playing: Watch this: What I learned buying a car in a pandemic

8: 16

Shapiro said a federal standard would help, but he was skeptical such a law was likely under the Trump Administration. He said he’s seen the White House move to weaken consumer protections, like hampering the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, not strengthen them.

eBay said it’s blocked or removed over 20 million items that are price gouging or claiming to stop or cure coronavirus. It’s also working directly with state attorneys general on the problem.

These efforts are helping, but it’s important consumers not let their guard down. Shapiro said that while his office is now primarily focused on following up every price gouging tip it receives, he has found price gouging spread throughout the commonwealth and split across online, big box and corner stores.

In one example, Shapiro’s office reached a settlement with Nature’s Garden in Reading, after the retailer sold two-packs of face masks for $23.95 per pair. The store agreed to pay $1,400 in civil penalties and $224 in restitution to customers.

New York Attorney General Letitia James‘ office said it’s sent more than 1,500 cease and desist orders to wholesalers and merchants of essential products like bread and diapers, with the vast majority of complaints stemming from New York City.

Anyone who wants to report potential price gouging problem can contact their state attorney general. Pennsylvania set up a specific email address for the problem at pricegouging@attorneygeneral.gov and New York consumers can submit coronavirus-related reports online. Also, eBay has a webpage to report listings.

“We are simply not going to tolerate you taking advantage of people during this pandemic,” Shapiro said. “Pennsylvanians have a legal right to fair pricing on essential goods, small businesses have a right to fair pricing on essential goods. And if you interfere with that and break the law, we will hold you accountable.”

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Here Are the Best Weekend Jobs to Earn Extra Cash

Whether you're trying to be better about your budget or save up for a big purchase, you can leverage your weekends to earn extra money. One of the best ways to make money is to take on a side gig. In this article, you'll find the best weekend jobs that we found to help you earn extra cash.

Some of these jobs allow you to earn money from the comfort of your home. Others are best for working outside the home, and only require that you have access to resources like a smartphone or a reliable car.

Start a Blog

If you love to write and have specific topic knowledge, you could earn money by starting a blog. While there are some overhead and time without making any money when you start a blog, you can build a significant passive income on as little as a few hours per week.

Take the time to learn how bloggers earn money before you start this side hustle. You should begin by having plenty of quality content. That will take a while to create, but once you have it, you can start to attract your target audience. Then, you can continue to create content that your audience loves and, finally, monetize it. There are plenty of monetization tactics, but you can choose to sell products to your audience, earn money from ads, and receive affiliate income. One blog can provide several streams of passive income.

Drive for Uber

If you want to start earning money today, you might want to consider driving for a rideshare company like Lyft or Uber. All you need to get started is a clean record, a car that's in good shape, and a smartphone. Drivers must have a valid driver's license and be at least 18 years old. After you create your profile, you simply wait for it to be approved, then get started driving. While driving for a rideshare company won't make you rich, it will allow you to set your schedule and start earning money quickly.

Deliver Food & Items

If driving people around isn't for you, you can consider delivering food for them instead. Companies like DoorDash and Instacart will allow people to sign up on their apps to deliver food to people in your area. The pay on DoorDash is contingent on the size of the order your customers' purchase. There is a minimum earning per order, and you can also accept tips from the people that you deliver to.

If you don't want to deliver food, you can consider delivering for a company like Amazon with Amazon Flex. Amazon Flex operates in about 50 cities around the country, and users can sign up to deliver items from Amazon warehouses to their owners. While there is a chance that Flex drivers will have to deliver food items from Amazon Fresh or Amazon Restaurants, most of the deliveries on this app are standard packages.

Do Retail Arbitrage

Retail arbitrage is when individuals buy items in retail stores for a lower price than they can sell them online. Then, they sell the items online for a profit. The most popular websites to sell items are Amazon or eBay.

Amazon FBA, or fulfillment by Amazon, is the most common platform to resell items on. Once users have acquired items to resell, the FBA website helps users upload items to Amazon and price them. Then, people send items to Amazon. When an item sells, Amazon fulfills the order.

Before you get started with retail arbitrage, take time to do your research. You should understand the items that you are selling as well as the market you are selling in to.

Freelance Writing

Are you a skilled writer? Freelance writing is a great way to earn money online from your home. Most writers can earn between 10 cents and $1 per word they write. Others choose to price based on how long it takes them to write rather than the amount of content. Earning depends on your industry, time it takes you to create a piece, and how reputable you are as a creator.

You can get started with freelance writing by checking out job postings on websites like Upwork or Freelancer.com. You can also use your network to see what entrepreneurs need content written or reach out to local businesses to offer your services.

Create an Etsy Store

Do you have a craft that you could sell? Perhaps you love making candles or can hand-dye fabrics.

Websites like Etsy provide a platform for people to connect with potential buyers. There is no overhead to use the site. Users upload a description and photos of their products and price them. Then, people can purchase them online. The creators are expected to send the items as soon as possible.

The earning potential here is entirely up to how much you sell your product for, and how attractive it is to buyers. Therefore, be sure to take the time to get great photos of your creations and price them accordingly.

Take Surveys

Survey companies are a middleman between businesses that need research and individuals who want to earn money online. You can get paid up to a few dollars per survey that you take, and each survey takes up to half an hour to finish. While this isn't an opportunity to get rich quick, you could earn money just for giving your opinion.

To get started, research the best sites to take surveys. Then, set aside time each weekend to complete a few of the surveys. Many survey sites will pay you cash, but others allow you to cash out via PayPal or will give you gift cards in exchange for your time and opinions.

Self-Publish

Have you been waiting to finally write your book? If you love to write stories, memoirs, or how-to guides, then you might be able to earn serious cash by self-publishing. If you haven't self-published because you think it's a complicated process, then good news: it's not difficult!

Using the Kindle Direct Publishing platform (KDP), they take care of all the technical aspects of publishing. You simply upload a completed document, add a cover image and description of your book, and Amazon takes care of the rest. Once you have your book listed on Amazon, you can choose to advertise or share your listing with anyone you want. Your book could keep earning passive income for years to come!

Flip Furniture

If you have a keen eye and are willing to do a bit of research, you could make decent money flipping items. For example, if you know a bit about antique furniture, you can keep an eye out on Craigslist and Facebook Marketplace for free or very cheap items.

Then, you can pick them up, make any minor improvements that you can. Sometimes, it's as easy as cleaning an item. Other times, you might have to replace a part, paint it, or make other improvements. Finally, you can resell the items at a higher price on the same platforms.

You could also use this process to buy and sell (flip) other items. For example, you could flip cars, electronics, or other items.

Bartender

Many people spend time in bars on the weekends. However, only the select few can earn money from being there. Bartending is an excellent job for people who don't mind working odd hours, love the bar culture, and love having conversations with people.

Some bartenders enter the market working in dive bars or local establishments. However, plenty of companies are also hiring part-time bartenders to work special events. That might mean that you can travel a bit, meet diverse people, and work for a well-established company.

Become a Tour Guide

If you love where you're from, you could earn extra cash by showing it off. While many tour companies are looking for people that are passionate about the area, you could also start your tours.

For example, if you live in Chicago, you could post a walking city tour on Airbnb Experiences. Then, set your hours and allow people to sign up for your tours. You might want to add something unique to set your tour apart like stopping by the most Instagrammable spots in Chicago or telling ghost stories about Chicago's past. This will help attract a specific group of people who know what to expect from your tour.

It is up to you to decide how to price your tour. Most city tours cost at least $25, and if you only host tours when you have at least four people signed up, you can guarantee that you earn at least $100 per tour that you lead. If your tours are two hours or less, you can earn well over $50 per hour.

The Bottom Line

As you decide how you'll earn money on the weekends, know that you have several options. You can earn money from your couch by creating a blog or taking surveys, or you could get out and show off your city. The possibilities are limitless!

The post Here Are the Best Weekend Jobs to Earn Extra Cash appeared first on Your Money Geek.

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Sharing is caring! Regardless of if it’s a startup or an established company – growth is the only valid metric that dictates the company’s success. A startup must grow quickly – acquire more users and revenue, to circumvent therisk of failing (90% failure rate!). On the other hand, larger, more established companies are at therisk of becoming irrelevant ($1 trillion at risk in U.S. based companies alone!). They must focus on pulling in more customers and retaining them as users. This is where growth hacking comes in. What is Growth Hacking? Growth hacking pertains to using low-cost techniques to bring about growth – typically by pulling in new users. Growth in this context can also mean selling more products or retaining existing customers by intensifying brand exposure and interaction. The term ‘Growth Hacking’ first emerged in 2010. Sean Ellis coined it, and its ideology brought about a fast track marketing culture that is booming away. Loads of companies, most notably tech-oriented startups began to employ these strategies. The growth tactics generated more leads, boasted higher conversion rates, and significantly increased both brand awareness and perception. Source: https://www.marketingcharts.com/customer-centric/analytics-automated-and-martech-29037/attachment/ifbyphone-growth-hackers-and-marketing-metrics-apr2013 According to the State of Inbound, generating leads and traffic are two of the most challenging goals that marketers struggle with. Source: https://cdn2.hubspot.net/hubfs/3476323/State%20of%20Inbound%202018%20Global%20Results.pdf Not only does growth hacking enable marketing teams to overcome these challenges, but it also allows them to track their progress and will enable them to make amends along the way. The marketing industry changes its focusevery few years as a response to change in trends. Growth hacking is an in-demand skill, and thetrillion-dollar industry has morphed to adopt it as a critical marketing tool. Here is a brief rundown of how growth hacking is done. How to do Growth Hacking: ‘Growth hacking’ is an umbrella term – and there are multiple strategies that can be employed to boost growth. Here are some of the effective broad growth hacking tactics anyone can try: Blogging: People from across the globe use the internet to scour for entertainment, information, and opinion. Content consumption is now an integral part of daily life. Creating and putting up high-quality content is a super effective growth tactic. Email marketing: Integrating an email form to a website and building a mailing list is one of the most effective ways of increasing brand interaction. The average ROI for email marketing is $38 for every dollar invested. CTAs: Regardless of what the website is about, having a call-to-action is a must. CTAs are more effective than Google’s AdWords. Supplying value for free: Be it a monthly newsletter, an e-book, or a trial for your services, offering free stuff to your visitors is one of the best ways of improving brand engagement. Free trials average a 60% conversion rate. Looking at other brands’ approaches to growth in the market and their circumstances will help you better understand which tactic is best suited for any given situation. Here are 15 companies that hacked their growth in the market. Incredible Examples of Growth Hacking: #1. Uber This ridesharing behemoth boasts110 million users worldwide and dominates the ridesharing market,holding a 70% market share. As reported byStatista, the ride-sharing platform generated a whopping net revenue of $11.3 billion in 2018 alone and is currently valued at $76 billion. One of Uber’s most compelling growth tactics is their referral program. They have aseparate referral program for drivers and passengers. 92% of all consumers trust recommendations from friends and family more than advertising. Leveraging word of mouth in this way, and offering free rides to both referrer and the new customer expanded their userbase exponentially. Their review system was aninstant hit and made it easier to avail of quality services. Another super useful growth hack Uber uses to date is theviral promotion tactic. Although this tactic may seem simple, every such promotion makes brand engagement go through the roof. #2. Airbnb Overtwo million people check into an Airbnb every night. In 2017, Airbnb reported a gross revenue of $2.6 billion.  The company is valued at $38 billion and claims to have generated over a billion dollars in gross revenue in the second quarter of 2019. Airbnb’s famous Craigslist growth hack dates back to the company’s ‘lift-off’ stagesaround 2010. They realized that Craigslist had a massive userbase that Airbnb can utilize. The founders also realized that the people on Craigslist represent their ideal target audience. So, they began to ask hosts also to post their listings on Craigslist. A little later, a bot was built that would automatically post new Airbnb listings to Craigslist. Another effective, but slightly grey-hat marketing tactic Airbnb used initially isCraigslist listing farming. If a user posts a listing on Craigslist, they’d receive an email from a “fan” recommending Airbnb to them. More often than not, the person would jump ship and post to Airbnb instead. #3. Instagram It isone of the most popular social media platforms. Instagram hasover a billion active users and is thesecond most-preferred social media platform. According toStatista, Instagram generated $6.84 billion in 2018 and will make at least 14 billion dollars in 2019. The platform is worth over$100 billion. A product as polished as Instagram for image sharing didn’t exist back in 2010. The great idea and execution fuelled the company’s rapid growth. It grew so fast that thefounders struggled to keep it from crashing from all the new users flooding in. Facebook bought Instagram for$1 billion in 2012, polished the platform, and set up a robust business model that would bring inover half a billion dollars in three years. #4. PayPal PayPal dominates the online payment market. This popular gateway holds an impressive60.18% market share. For the past three years, PayPal has consistently processed over100 billion dollars. In the second quarter of 2019, PayPal processed a net total of172.36 billion dollars. Their net income in 2018 was$2.05 billion. The company is worth over$61 billion. PayPal’s referral program is, to date, one of the most effective marketing programs ever carried out. After justone month of its launch, PayPal has acquired over 100,000 customers. As the customer base grew, they graduallydecreased the incentives until they reached their goal. PayPal also manufactured popularity using eBay. The team approached the largest sellers on eBay and offered to sell them products at lucrative prices, with one condition – they pay them using PayPal. With more and more sellers using PayPal, eBay eventuallyintegrated PayPal as an official payment option on its platform in 2003. #5. Facebook Facebook is the world’smost famous social networking platform. In the second quarter of 2019, it had2.4 billion monthly active users, making it the most preferred social media website globally. Facebook generated a total revenue of $55.8 billion in 2018. The company is worth over $540 billion. In aForbes interview, Andy Johns, who was a growth hacker at Facebook in their initial stages, spoke about the methods they used to grow at such a rapid pace. The most effective tactic was enabling embeddable badges/profile widgets for users to embed on their websites and blogs. These generated billions of impressions each day. The links were clicked millions of times a day, and accounts were subsequently made due to a rise in interest. Facebook also began to acquire service providers from all around the globe. The technology these companies possessed enabled Facebook toprocure more email addresses. #6. LinkedIn LinkedIn boastsover 660 million users. A study in 2017 found thatover 122 million people have been invited for an interview through LinkedIn. As of 2019, LinkedIn has over20 million job postings from across the world at any given time. According toStatista, LinkedIn generated over $5.2 billion in revenue in 2018. In 2019, its projected revenue exceeds 6.75 billion dollars. LinkedIn, too, used referrals to achieve virality. However, the referral program employed was more traditional than modern – Reid Hoffman, the founder, used his network of successful friends to lift LinkedIn off the ground. In aCNN interview, Reid speaks about how the 13 people associated with the company invited 112 people to join the platform. Growth was slow, but the platform gradually began to gain traction in Silicon Valley. By the end of the first week, they hadover 12,000 registered users. In a year, the company had amassed over 500,000 users. In 2005, the company launched three new revenue streams: job listings, advertisements, and subscriptions. These made LinkedIn super profitable in 2006 (bringing inover $10 million!). #7. YouTube Each day, overone billion hours of video are watched on YouTube. It is thesecond most visited site globally. The website is worth over$160 billion by itself, not considering the revenue Google generates. YouTube will generate an estimated11.76 billion dollars in ad revenue in 2020. YouTube hacked its growth by making the content on their website easy to share. Back in 2005, there was no easy way to share videos, and enabling sharing video using embed codes on blogs, and even other websites put YouTube front and center. This move not only made their brand more recognizable, but it also helped create the necessary backlinks that propelled their site’s popularity. Their strategy worked, and by 2015, YouTube was processing over3 billion searches every month. #8. Hotmail The email service launched in 1996. Only 20 days after its launch in July,over 20,000 people were already using Hotmail. It was growing so fast that the service caught Microsoft’s eye and was sold for a whopping $400 million in 1997. At this point, Hotmail had already amassed 12 million users (which was 1/5th ofall users on the internet). How? It was because of an ingenious marketing tactic. The founders came up with a way to pull new users without having to spend any money. They included a “Get your free email at Hotmail” signature at the end of every email that was being sent. Source: https://www.flickr.com/photos/mynetx/4690702547 When the tag was clicked, the recipient was redirected to a sign-up page using which one could create an account quickly. #9. Gmail In October 2018, Gmail had over1.5 billion active users. It is the world’smost used email domain. Gmail wasn’t always this popular. However, when it was launched in 2004, it had much better email management capabilities than its competition, which made it highly desirable. Google generated hype for its email service using scarcity as a marketing tactic. Gmail was initially invite-only. Limited ‘invites’ were granted to existing users, which created a lot of demand for the service. The invites were so desirable that people began to auction them. You would find people selling invites on eBayfor as much as $125 per invite! #10. Groove Groove had their “aha” moment when Alex Turnbull, the CEO, realized that no other SaaS company employed content marketing as a growth tactic. The company’s user base exploded when Alex decided to openly share his experiences with his audience using theGroove blog. He alsoreached out to customers, asking them why they signed up with Groove. This supplied valuable insight and enable better marketing. Now, Groove is positioned to make over$10 million a year. #11. Dropbox In April 2009, just two years of its inception, Dropbox had amassed one million registered users. Another million users had joined by September 2009, andanother million by November in the same year. The rapid growth is a result of the company gamifying their services. Existing users would get additional online storage when they completed particular challenges. Inviting other users, following their social media handles, sharing feedback, and even uploading files from select devices added more and more space to the user’s account. The company is worth now worth over12 billion dollars and generated$400 million in the third quarter of 2019. As of 2018, Dropbox hasover 12.7 million paying users. #12. Netflix Netflix currently has over158 million paying subscribers from across the globe. Netflix has been in the movie renting business for over two decades. However, it grew into a household name only because of targeted marketing. Retargeting the company’s finances to focus on the booming streaming industry gave the company more marketing flexibility. Investing capital generated into making exclusive movies and TV shows also gave Netflix an edge over its competitors. Catering recommendations based on location and culture made their service super appealing. The company generated a little over $18.8 billion in 2019 and is worth$136.33 billion. #13. Shazam The app has been installedover one billion times! Shazam was perfectly positioned to make great use of word of mouth marketing. When it was first launched in the UK in 2002, it was known as 2580. It was an extension that, when dialed, would pick up the audio and return a message with the name of the track and its artist. It became super popular in a matter of months. As of 2018, the service isactively used by 478 million people. #14. Slack Slack has it’s name up in the fastest growing business’s hall of fame. It went from zero tobeing worth seven billion dollars in less than five years! The reason for the app’s rapid growth is excellent timing and better PR. With more and more startups popping up and rapidly scaling their growth, there was a need for these teams to organize internal communication better. Slack was the answer to every startup’s communication needs. The PR team came up with a great hook, “The Email Killer.” Using the founder’s reputation from their previous successful venture, Flickr, the PR team connected with multiple tech publishers and attracted new users at an exponential rate. #15. HubSpot Hubspot is valued atover six billion dollars andgenerated $513 million in 2018. HubSpot gained popularity by supplying free online tools for people to gain insights about theirwebsite and theirTwitter account. These free tools were handy marketing tools and acted as a catalyst for HubSpot’s initial growth. Another super effective tactic that HubSpot employed is their blog. They put up content that added a lot of value to readers’ lives. The CTAs were tailored to match the post they were reading, which made for better conversion rates and higher brand engagement overall. Growth hacking is a relatively new marketing tactic. Although we can trace some similar tactics back to their older, offline origins, it has been around for about ten years. However, in this short time, we have already managed to create highly-effective techniques and even labeled some for conventional use. Following these techniques can work, but the real key to hacking growth lies in thinking analytically and identifying growth opportunities. These companies found ways for people to start talking about their product and start adopting it. At the end of the day, people must connect to the brand in powerful ways for the brand to gain momentum in the market. Even the most fruitful modern marketing tactics are based on the principle of people connecting – either with the company itself or with one another using the company’s services. Content marketing and social media marketing workso effectively for this reason. Referral programs used by Uber and Dropbox, Gmail, and Hotmail’s invite system and LinkedIn’s networking tactic allowed people to connect and gain value over their connection. When YouTube enabled sharing videos freely, It also allowed people to connect without limitations. Finding the right pattern and tailoring it to work with the target user base is the right way to hack a company’s growth. Nonetheless, the most effective growth hacking tactics are those that find ways to connect people. /*Archive Template Only*/ #wp-coupons-outer-wrapper { padding-left: 20px; padding-right: 20px; } #wp-coupons-wrapper { max-width: 1200px; } /*Navigation*/ body .wp-coupons-nav a, body .wp-coupons-nav a:visited { font-size: ; color: #0c0402; } body .wp-coupons-nav a:hover, body .wp-coupons-nav a.wp-coupons-nav-selected { color: #0872aa; } body .wp-coupons-subnav a, body .wp-coupons-subnav a:visited { font-size: ; color: #0c0402; border-color: #0c0402; } body .wp-coupons-subnav a.active, body .wp-coupons-subnav a:hover { color: #0872aa; border-color: #0872aa; } /*Coupon Panel*/ .wp-coupons-coupon-panel { background: #e5e5e5; } .wp-coupons-coupon-panel .wp-coupons-discount-percent { background: #1b3e5a; color: #ffffff; font-size: ; } .wp-coupons-coupon-panel .wp-coupons-expiration { color: ; font-size: ; } .wp-coupons-coupon-panel .wp-coupons-discount-code { background: #f9cc29; color: #0c0c0c; font-size: ; } .wp-coupons-coupon-panel .wp-coupons-discount-code span { color: #0c0c0c; border-color: #0c0c0c; } .wp-coupons-coupon-panel .wp-coupons-ctr:before { border-color: #f9cc29 transparent; } .wp-coupons-coupon-panel .wp-coupons-ctr:after { border-color: #f9cc29; } .wp-coupons-coupon-panel .coupon-separator { border-color: #d0d2d7; } .wp-coupons-coupon-panel .coupon-title { font-size: ; } .wp-coupons-coupon-panel .coupon-title, .wp-coupons-coupon-panel .coupon-title:visited, .wp-coupons-coupon-panel .coupon-link, .wp-coupons-coupon-panel .coupon-link:visited, .wp-coupons-banner .coupon-title { color: #0c0402; } .wp-coupons-coupon-panel .coupon-title:hover, .wp-coupons-coupon-panel .coupon-link:hover { color: #0872aa; } .wp-coupons-coupon-panel .coupon-description { font-size: 22px; line-height: ; min-height: ; max-height: ; } .wp-coupons-coupon-panel .coupon-type, .wp-coupons-coupon-panel .coupon-type:hover, .wp-coupons-coupon-panel .coupon-type:visited { color: #000000; font-size: ; } .wp-coupons-coupon-panel a.coupon-link { font-size: ; } /*Pagination*/ body .wp-coupons-navigation .page-numbers, body .wp-coupons-navigation .page-numbers:visited { background-color: #0c0402; } body .wp-coupons-navigation .page-numbers.current, body .wp-coupons-navigation .page-numbers:hover { background-color: #0872aa; } /*Click to Reveal Popup*/ #wp-coupons-ctr-popup #wp-coupons-ctr-discount-code span { background: #f9cc29; color: #0c0c0c; } #wp-coupons-ctr-popup #wp-coupons-ctr-discount-url a { color: #0c0402; } #wp-coupons-ctr-popup #wp-coupons-ctr-discount-url a:hover { color: #0872aa; } /*Buttons*/ body a.wp-coupons-button { background: #0c0402; border-color: #0c0402; font-size: ; } body a.wp-coupons-button:hover { color: #0872aa; border-color: #0872aa; } @media(min-width: 794px) { .wp-coupons-coupon.list.compact .wp-coupons-coupon-panel .coupon-link, .wp-coupons-coupon.list.minimal .wp-coupons-coupon-panel .coupon-link { font-size: 22px; line-height: ; } } source http://wtf.telenor.com.np/2019/12/26/what-is-growth-hacking-definition-and-examples/

http://m.globalone.com.np/2019/12/what-is-growth-hacking-definition-and.html

[stebridgwater35]

LifeHacker.co.ukLifeHacker aims to help its users out with life in the modern world. Popular tags include ‘Productivity’, ‘Money’ and ‘DIY’.PdfEditor :Edit PDF Online.Itsalmo.St :Cool Timer For Major Events Like Birthdays, New Year Or Anything Important.Free Rice :Donate Rice While Improving Vocabulary.Unfurlr.Com :Find Out Which URL Is Behind Any Short Url.Deadmansswitch :Send Emails Even When You Are Dead.Time Zone Converter :Check out time zone of the worlds.MentalFloss.comAlthough essentially one of many time-wasting student websites, MentalFloss is good for learning interesting facts from around the world, covering topics such as food, culture and science. Admittedly, its main function may be as a procrastination aid, but you should still learn something.UnplugTheTV.comThis student resource offers an alternative to TV (and, unfortunately, studying), hosting randomized videos on interesting scientific topics.Sleepyti.meThis site tells you the best times to go to bed if you have to be up at a certain hour – a very useful tool within student life. Taking into account regular sleep cycles, Sleepyti.me can help if you suffer from grogginess in the mornings.KeepMeOut.comIf you struggle to stay away from social media when you’re meant to be studying, use KeepMeOut to block certain distracting websites.EdX.orgEdx is one of the world’s leading MOOC platforms. MOOCs (massive open online courses) are offered for free to anyone wishing to learn. Other major MOOC providers include Udacity.com, AcademicEarth.org and...Coursera.orgCoursera covers a wide range of academic learning, allowing you to supplement your studies with some additional knowledge.StudentRecipes.comExactly what it says on the tin, StudentRecipes.com has recipes for 4,000 quick and easy student meals.PST to EST:Check pst to est time now.Recipepuppy.comRecipePuppy allows you to search for recipes based on the ingredients you already have at home. Lazy students, rejoice.Instructables.comThis is one of the most useful online student resources if you like making and fixing things yourself. You can learn anything from how to make spaghetti ice-cream to how to fix a broken shelf.Duolingo.Com :Learn New Languages For Free And In An Interesting WaySmallpdf :For All Your PDF Needs You Can Imagine.Pixlr :Photoshop Your Images Online.MailDrop :Quick Disposable Email Address To Let You Sign Up At Not So Useful Websites.Time Difference calculator :check time difference between any cities of the world with your local city time.The Ultimate Health Food GuideThis guide will be a lifesaver throughout student life for times when you’re feeling wrung out, stressed or ill. Whatever your ailments, visit this resource to find out what foods to eat to build your immunity and vitality back up.WebMD.comWebMD allows you to check your current health status using its symptom checker. Although this resource is great for hypochondriacs, it doesn’t replace the knowledge of a real doctor – go offline and visit your university’s health center if you’re really concerned.NHS.ukThe website of the UK’s National Health Service provides information on all kinds of illnesses, conditions, diseases and treatments. The site also gives comprehensive information on sexual health.DontPassItOn.co.ukDontPassItOn provides free chlamydia and gonorrhea testing kits by post to UK citizens aged 16-24.ASHASexualHealth.orgSexual health advice and resources for those based in the US.Ebay.comWell-established consumer-to-consumer site Ebay allows you to buy, sell or auction off almost anything, including clothing, electronic devices and antiques. It could come in handy if your student budget needs a boost, or if you want to find some bargains.TheBookPond.comThe Book Pond allows you to sell your old academic textbooks or buy the ones you need from other students who are ready to pass them on.Amazon.comAmazon sells everything under the sun, including books, e-books and textbooks you may need for your program. However, its critics say it’s damaging to independent bookstores, so you may want to consider using your local store instead of always shopping online.Gumtree.comGumtree advertises jobs, second-hand goods, properties and services for people around the UK. If you’re a student in the UK, it can be a good place to search for part-time job opportunities, look for accommodation, sell things you don’t need any more, or even swap goods or skills.Craigslist.comThe global version of Gumtree, Craigslist is big in the US and has many city/area divisions, so you can find listings close to you.Freecycle.orgThis online platform allows you to give away your unwanted things or get your hands on what other people are giving away. Handy for furniture and general bric-a-brac.Local Time :Check any country local time now.Groupon.comGroupon offers daily deals on things such as spa days, fancy restaurants and city breaks. It’s not exactly the place to go to for the essentials of student life, but it’s a good way to treat yourself at the end of a stressful exam period, perhaps.MoneySavingExpert.comMoneySavingExpert has advice on everything from cheap flights to the best bank interest rates, helping your student budget stretch further.Mint.comFree to use, Mint can help you organize your finances and track your spending.MyVoucherCodes.co.ukMyVoucherCodes offers vouchers and discounts for a huge number of retail stores and restaurants within the UK. If you’re in the US, RetailMeNot is the place to go. (GMT to EST)UniDays.comJust one of many student websites offering discounts, UniDays lists thousands of student discounts and offers around the globe. It’s free to join and also available as an app.WiseBread.comWiseBread is dedicated to living well on a tight budget – whether you’re a student or just trying to get more for your money. It offers advice on everything from debt management to growing your own fruit and vegetables.Genius.com poetryAn offshoot of Rap Genius, Lit Genius is a place where scholars have formed a community to annotate poetry and literature, both classic and recent. It’s an extremely helpful resource for English literature students in particular.TED.comTED hosts thought-provoking talks given at events all over the world on the core topics of technology, entertainment and design – but in fact covering pretty much every aspect of human experience. The TED site is where you can find all the videos of these talks. They’re another good procrastination device, but you may also find some inspiration for your next essay.Wikipedia.orgAlthough your tutors will tell you never to reference Wikipedia in assignments, the collaboratively edited encyclopedia project can be a very useful tool for early-stage research into your assignment or project.Bartleby.comBartleby publishes classic literature, poetry, non-fiction and reference texts free of charge.Gutenberg.orgSimilarly, Project Gutenberg provides free online access to texts whose copyright has expired; so far, it’s digitized more than 56,000 texts.Wolframalpha.Com :Computational Search For Your KeywordsQuizlet :Free online flashcards for learning vocabulary..Diigo :Collect, share,and interact on information from anywhere on the Web.SimplyNoise.Com :Just Plain Sounds To Help You Sleep.Rhymer.Com :Find Rhyme For Any Word! Cool Tool For PoetsQClock :Find Local Time Of A Place.Picasa :A free image editing and organization tool from Google. via /r/UsefulWebsites

[topicprinter]

I was inspired by a post I saw in /r/startups asking for advice about learning programming to start a startup. Instead of replying to that post, I figured I'd just type this up and share with everyone on /r/EntrepreneurPeople, you don't need to add more barriers to your life. If you're on Reddit, you're already smarter than like 80% of the population and can probably use Google to find anything.You're already a step ahead of most people and overthinking shit.So, instead of worrying which book you need to read next, which programming language you need to learn to develop an app, or which course will finally push you over the edge.Just do this.Read this tiny list post and see the world is at your fingertips, and most of it is free.You can start a business for next to nothing utilizing a few of these platforms.You don't need more time.You can start right now,.Google Suite (Sheets, Docs, .etc - You can write an entire eBook in Docs, publish to PDF then upload to..)Gumroad (upload your digital product here, make money. I've never paid a dime)Stripe (bill people, one-time, recurring. Tons of potential)GetHarvest (invoice people for free, connects with Stripe)Typeform (customer/client intake, lead gen)Wordpress (content, website)Pexels ,.etc (Stock Images for websites or ads)Canva (image editing, ad creation)Zapier (connecting all kinds of crazy shit together)Twilio (With a little skill you can use this to text alerts to people and reach them cheaply)Mailchimp (Build an email list, email them things, they buy)DigitalOcean + ServerPilot (The cheapest way to host & setup WP. You can do this for about $5/mo and scale unlimited. I personally use them for every new website I create.)Facebook (Leverage your friends and their friends, "Hey mom, would you pay monthly for this 30 day supply of chocolate bras?")LinkedIn (see Facebook, but think B2B lead gen, "Hey X, Let's chat about how awesome your company is!" then close)Trello (KanBan, stay organized)Zoom (video chat with all the people's, host a webinar)YouTube (build an audience of millions for free)Instagram (see YouTube)Pinterest (Drive people to your content/products for free)Reddit (Post here, be awesome, you *might* be rewarded)Fiverr (people make or do shit for you, cheaply)Upwork (hire people cheaply, or not cheaply - your choice.)Craigslist (it's not just for finding skanky hookups, you can actually find clients (and ideas) here!)Uber/Lyft (Whaaat? Yep. You can get paid to pitch your business to people while you drive. Captive audience.)Meetup (Join startup meetups and troll for business, "Yo. I market SaaS, let's work together!", find potential co-founders)Medium (Write amazing shit. Reach amazingly powerful (and intelligent) people)This list, while not definitive in any way, shows you the power of the Internet today. You can build an entire business using platforms like this and you can certainly MVP something with just a few of them. The rest is up to you.Do you want it bad enough?

[neptunecreek]

Facing Facebook: Data Portability and Interoperability Are Anti-Monopoly Medicine

Social media has a competition problem, and its name is Facebook. Today, Facebook and its subsidiaries are over ten times more valuable than the next two largest social media companies outside China—Twitter and Snapchat—combined. It has cemented its dominance by buying out potential competitors before they’ve had a chance to grow (like Instagram) and waging wars of attrition against others (like Snapchat) when it can’t. Because of its massive reach across much of the world, the platform can effectively censor public speech, perform psychological experiments, and potentially sway elections on the scale of a nation-state. And if users don’t like the way Facebook wields this power, there is nowhere else as ubiquitous or as well-populated for them to go.

It’s going to take multiple changes to fix the problems, in free expression and elsewhere, caused by Facebook’s dominance. If we’re going to have a real shot at it, one thing that needs to change is giving users meaningful control of their own data.

Facebook’s trove of user data is its most valuable asset, which presents a dilemma. Thanks to network effects, every user who joins a social network makes it more valuable for advertisers and more useful to everyone else. Without some access to the data Facebook has, it’s virtually impossible for upstart platforms to compete with the behemoth now used by nearly a third of the world.

At the same time, the ways Facebook chooses to share its data often go terribly wrong. Users have been rightfully outraged to learn about Facebook’s troublesome use and misuse of their data in the past, including the recent Cambridge Analytica scandal. Since these breaches of trust were often enabled by Facebook’s third-party APIs, some analysts have come to the conclusion that there’s an unavoidable trade-off between interoperability and privacy.

There’s some truth to that, but it’s too simplistic. And it leads to appointing Facebook keeper and protector of the world’s data.

We believe there’s another way to look at it.

Facebook should let users take back control of their own data. This doesn’t raise the same privacy problems as letting third parties suck up everything about all of us. If done with care, it can be accomplished without opening the door to shady actors like Cambridge Analytica. In addition, Facebook has to start thinking differently about how it interacts with third-party developers. Instead of granting them access to data but forcing them to work within its walled garden, Facebook should serve as a hub, allowing developers to create new experiences for users that build off of the core service it offers and hosts. Ultimately, Facebook does not have to be any less diligent about protecting users from malicious actors. It just has to stop “protecting” them from legitimate competitors.

Facebook already recognizes that it is under pressure to improve its data portability story. Last week it announced that, along with Twitter, it was joining Microsoft and Google’s data portability initiative, the Data Transfer Project. While we applaud that move on behalf of all of these tech companies, our concern is that this, and similar, projects will be used to fend off regulation without substantially changing the status quo. The Data Transfer Project is a set of tools and standards to make it technologically easier to move data from one place to another. However, without substantive changes to the Facebook’s policies and processes, this project alone won’t give us meaningful portability away from the tech giants or tools that empower end-users themselves.

We think Facebook should:

Give users a tool for real data portability. That includes a way to export the rich contact list that Facebook hosts and the tracking data Facebook collects without meaningful consent.

Open up its platform policy to enable competitors, cooperators, and follow-on innovators. Allow developers to use Facebook’s APIs for software that modifies or competes with the core Facebook experience.

Interoperate with next generation of social networks via open standards. Adapt Facebook’s APIs to use the W3C’s social web protocols where appropriate, and allow open, federated services like Mastodon to work with Facebook as partners.

Let’s go into more detail on each of these.

Make data truly portable

Data portability allows a user to take their data and move it to a different platform. Many tech companies have long supported data portability as a core value.

Facebook, however, has a history of taking advantage of the data portability features offered by other companies as a means to an end: growing its own network. In its early years, for example, Facebook benefited immensely from Google's portability efforts. Facebook encouraged users to download their contacts lists from Gmail, then upload them to Facebook, in order to build out its social network.

At the same time, Facebook has always dragged its feet when it comes to portability from its own platform. In its early years, Facebook displayed users’ email addresses on their profile pages, not as text, but as images, making it frustratingly difficult to download lists of friends’ contact information, or even to copy and paste a single address into an email client. Until recently, Facebook’s data export tool provided users with an inscrutable, unparseable mess of text and HTML.

Europe’s General Data Privacy Regulation (GDPR), which took effect May 25, 2018, declares data portability a basic right for all European citizens. In accordance with GDPR, Facebook’s newest export tool allows users everywhere to download their data in the machine-readable JSON format. But Facebook’s export tool only includes a small subset of the data the company actually has about its users, and it falls short of empowering users to pick up their data and take their business elsewhere.

Facebook’s promise to work with the Data Transport Project is encouraging, but if they don’t use it as an opportunity to address wider issues with their current tools, it won’t mean substantial change for users.

Free the friends list

Facebook’s newest data-export tool exports friends lists—the building blocks of the social network, and arguably the data most critical to its competitive advantage—in the form of plain-text names without unique identifiers. This makes it impossible for a user to take their list of friends to a competing service. Any social network trying to parse Facebook’s list won’t be able to tell whether “John Smith” refers to John Smith in Haight-Ashbury, John Smith in Sri Lanka, or John Smith the 17th-century British explorer.

Facebook has claimed it doesn’t want to let users export their friends’ email addresses for privacy reasons, but remember that Facebook was more than happy to take advantage of Gmail’s tool to grow its own network. Facebook could build a better export tool without raising tough privacy questions. Associating names with unique identifiers, like “John Smith, user number 100372813,” would allow competing services to disambiguate common names.

It’s not just competing social media companies that would benefit. Facebook friends lists are essentially rich “contact lists” that give its other products, especially WhatsApp and Messenger, a distinct competitive advantage. Facebook was built on data ported from the incumbent services of its time. Now, it’s time to return the favor.

Let users see how they’re being tracked

Another area where Facebook’s tool is seriously lacking is in the advertisement data it exports. The company tracks whenever you use one of the hundreds of thousands of websites and apps that use Facebook technology, and it uses those data to target ads. You can see a list of plain-text “topics” that Facebook believes you’re interested in, but there is no record of the browsing data the company used to determine those interests.

With these trackers, Facebook is engaged in massive, nonconsensual surveillance of its users’ habits both on the web and on their phones. You can’t opt out of collection or delete these data—the best you can do is to stop it with a tracker blocker like Privacy Badger. We think Facebook should stop this entirely, but the least it can do is let you see what it knows. If you could download Facebook’s ad-targeting database about you, other advertisers might pay handsomely for it, giving you a way to share in the profits from Facebook’s surveillance. You could construct a detailed record of where you’ve been, what sites you’ve visited, and what advertisers have paid Facebook for your eyeballs.

Recently, Facebook has hinted at giving users the ability to delete historical tracking data about them. This would be a great step forward, but ultimately, users deserve full control of when and how they are tracked. That includes first-class access to the detailed data Facebook has.

Interoperate, Federate, Innovate 

Interoperability is the extent to which one platform’s infrastructure can work with others. In software parlance, interoperability is usually achieved through Application Programming Interfaces (APIs)—interfaces that allow other developers to interact with an existing software service. For example, Facebook’s APIs allow third-party apps to verify a user’s identity, access their data, and even post on their behalf with that user’s permission.

When big companies build interoperable platforms, it’s often a boon to everyone. “Follow-on innovators” can leverage the tools that a platform has pioneered to make better experiences for the platform’s users, to offer novel tools that build on the platform’s strengths, and to allow users to interact with multiple major services at the same time. For example, PadMapper started by organizing data about rental housing pulled from Craigslist posts and presenting it in a useful way; Trillian allowed users to use multiple IM services through the same client and added features like encryption on top of AIM, Skype, and email. On a larger scale, digital interoperability enables decentralized, federated services like email, modern telephony networks, and the World Wide Web. Facebook’s lack of true interoperability, especially for enhancing or competing services, is one of the ways it has cemented its position.

Use app review to protect users, not stifle innovation

The Cambridge Analytica scandal was a result of Facebook offering extremely powerful APIs to third-party apps. Facebook made it too easy for apps to request data about users and all of their friends, and too easy for users to agree to sharing data without understanding the implications.

In response to the scandal, Facebook has tightened control over their interoperable tools across the board and removed some of the more problematic APIs altogether. However, the scandal has also given the company an excuse to make life more difficult for would-be innovators. We must detangle the two if we’re going to reduce Facebook’s power.

Currently, the “platform policy” that Facebook requires developers to agree to in order to use its APIs is designed to protect Facebook’s interests as much as, if not more than, its users’. For example, Section 4.2 prevents offering “experiences that change the way Facebook looks and functions.” This explicitly prevents app developers from trying to improve the UI, or even allowing users to customize it for themselves. Other clauses, like “respect the limits we’ve placed on Facebook functionality,” similarly reflect Facebook’s desire to maintain tight control over the ways its users interact with their data in the platform.

Furthermore, Section 4.1 states, “Don’t replicate core functionality that Facebook already provides.” This gives the company grounds to reject any competitive social network that would federate its service with Facebook.

App review is an important practice, and Facebook should continue working to prevent malicious developers from leveraging its platform to harm users. However, the company should allow others to build on and differ from what it has created in meaningful ways. A platform as vast and powerful as Facebook should be a jumping-off point for innovators, not a means for the company to impose a single experience on everyone in its network.

Interface with the next generation of federated social networks

Successful interoperability is almost always powered by open standards. Email is a good example. Thanks to widely-adopted protocols like SMTP and IMAP, you can sign up for an account on FastMail and send messages to your friends who use Gmail, Yahoo, AOL, and Microsoft seamlessly. Email is a federated service: it comprises many decentralized, independent service providers that communicate with a set of common, open standards. As a result, users get to choose both the company they trust to host their messages and the software they use to access them.

Facebook should adapt their APIs to work with the World Wide Web Consortium’s recently-developed Social Web Protocols, like ActivityStreams and ActivityPub. This would give developers a stable, flexible interface to Facebook’s platform and make it possible for Facebook to interoperate with the next generation of federated services like Mastodon. In the future, Facebook could become just one of a vast network of independent social servers. Users could choose to host their data on the service with the features and policies that they preferred and still be able to interact with their friends on Facebook and elsewhere.

It’s Not Just Facebook

There was a time when data portability was seen as a positive goal for emerging tech companies: Mark Zuckerberg said recently — with a tone of regret — that it was something Facebook engineers considered, many years ago:

I do think early on on the platform we had this very idealistic vision around how data portability would allow all these different new experiences, and I think the feedback that we’ve gotten from our community and from the world is that privacy and having the data locked down is more important to people than maybe making it easier to bring more data and have different kinds of experiences.

We disagree that’s how the feedback Facebook is receiving from users and lawmakers should be interpreted. What users want is both security and real control over their experience — and they don’t want to cede how to do that exclusively to what Mark Zuckerberg decides is appropriate.

But, to be clear, a choice between having Facebook decide what your needs are, or Google or Twitter or Microsoft, can’t be enough either. When we’re talking about nearly 8 billion people, it’s inconceivable that a handful of (largely American) companies will be able to deliver that balance for everybody.

With initiatives like the Data Transfer Project, we are concerned that these companies are already acting as though the most important portability is between their own shared conception of what an Internet service is. The Data Transfer Project will enable users to move data directly between two services, but it remains to be seen what data Facebook lets you transfer and where it lets those data go. We know there’s more to the Internet than this decade’s version of a successful, venture-capital funded, West Coast company. All of these companies need to hand back over control of people’s data, so we can decide what we want to do with it.

How We Get There

Facebook has the power to make all of these changes on its own. Doing so would mean a more socially responsible company, a better experience for its users, and a more level playing field for its competition. If the company isn’t willing to help, governments may have to step in. Congress can pass laws that mandate real data portability, as the GDPR already does in Europe. Such laws should require that data like a user’s friends list be accessible to that user in a useful format. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has authority to impose “behavioral remedies” on companies that illegally maintain market power. Fixes for data portability and interoperability could be part of an antitrust remedy or negotiated settlement with the FTC.

And if some politicians are  reticent to regulate the tech industry, there’s still work that could be done to empower users to fix the problem themselves — by fixing laws that prevent users from taking their data back. Facebook and the other tech giants fence off their data, even from end-users, through their narrow terms of service that seek to limit what users — or their tools — can do on a site or service. Users shouldn’t have to fear losing access to their account just because they have decided to download or scrape their own data from it. And no one in the Internet ecology should fear prosecution from statutes like the CFAA for empowering users to move, delete or examine the data that big tech has on them.

None of these solutions are not a panacea. Facebook wields other kinds of market power which smaller companies may not be able to overcome, and which we may need to address in other ways. But data portability and interoperability could help transform Facebook from an obstacle to a catalyst for innovation. If it were more feasible for users to take their data and move elsewhere, Facebook would need to compete on the strength of its product rather than on the difficulty of starting over. And if the platform were more interoperable, smaller companies could work with the infrastructure Facebook has already created to build innovative new experiences and open up new markets. Users are trapped in a stagnant, sick system. Freeing their data and giving them control are the first steps towards a cure.

This summer, EFF is looking at how corporate concentration is harming the Internet and how to fix it. Interoperability and data portability are just one set of tools, and Facebook is just one company. Stay tuned for more discussion about what’s wrong, who’s responsible, and the right and wrong ways to address it.

Related Cases: 

Facebook v. Power Ventures

from Deeplinks https://ift.tt/2JTKHUr

[arnoldbhuck]

Tampa Male Dancer

Top 10 Tips Hiring a Tampa male dancer.

Are you looking to host the wildest private party including some of the hottest exotic dancers Tampa has to offer? Look no further because when it comes to hiring the best Tampa strippers for bachelor or bachelorette parties use Hunks & Babes when only the best will do. With many rookie party planners booking their first exotic dancer in Tampa, it is important to utilize the following tips to ensure both parties are happy and your night is successful.

You can use one or all of these tips when ordering adult entertainment for your private bachelor, bachelorette, or birthday party. If anything, this information will give you excellent insight into an unfamiliar adult industry.

Tip #1 Spend time and thoroughly investigate the company you wish to do business with.

Here’s a big secret: A Tampa male dancer is an independent contractor who is free to work with any adult agency they choose. Ordering private party strippers online is not regulated or monitored by any group or agency and most likely never will be. It is up to consumers like you to report any wrongdoing or misrepresentation to social media or complaint websites. However, when researching your favorite online stripping agency, please keep in mind that reviews both good and bad could be written by competitors instead of real customers.

Tip #2 Compare photos of dancers in different regions within the same company website.

Newer agencies that try to expand into other cities they do not have coverage in copy and paste their exotic dancers who only work in one city. The same stripper who works in Chicago obviously can’t work in Las Vegas, but online stripping agencies have the same dancer for you to choose from. Employee turnover is also fairly high so you run into the risk of ordering a stripper who no longer works for the company.

Tip #3 Look for improper grammar, misspelled words, and mismatched exotic dancer stage names.

Most prices for ordering exotic dancers are competitive and do not fluctuate immensely. However, the overall cost of hiring a private dancer is expensive and premium quality service is expected. What kind of service should you expect from a company that does not maintain the quality of their own website?

Tip #4 Research using search engines and type in the company name or stage name with city.

It is common to use Google or Yahoo to research reputation and reliability. Most customers do not consider actually typing in an exotic dancer’s stage name + Tampa. You may be shocked to find the female or male stripper you’re looking at is actually much older than the pictures provided or that they work for multiple agencies. You may find comments on the actual dancer themselves and get a good grasp as to the authenticity of their entertainment. See if you can find the timestamp on the most recent comment and if it is longer than one year, chances are that guy or girl does not work anymore.

Tip #5 Find reviews or social media comments on each Tampa male dancer you’re looking to order.

To coincide with tip number four, you may stumble across the Facebook page of a Tampa stripper. Of course these pages can be monitored and changed to mold the desirable image and gain more business. It is difficult to create hundreds of fake profiles and like your page or even write detailed comments. There are even stripper LinkedIn profiles that you can look over. Be careful just like ordering entertainment off of craigslist, you do not know who are want will show up at your door to your event. Please use social media only as a method of research and not for contacting the exotic dancer. There have been cases of police sting operations arresting non-suspecting customers using nonconventional websites to hire disguised escorts. Just be safe and order from Hunks & Babes. None of our dancers escort and pass a rigid quality standards test.

Tip #6 Uncover the truth about Tampa female exotic dancers.

If you’re having a Tampa bachelor party and planning on having the hottest girls parading around in their sexiest lingerie, you might be correct. The breathtaking supermodel type strippers that rate over the 10+ scale usually are not doing toy shows for cheap tips. The upper echelons of exotic dancers know they do not have to get nasty dirty to get your money. They will work at the busiest Tampa strip clubs to maximize their exposure to as many hungry men as they can. Guys will empty their wallet simply to just be in the presence of this dream girl. If this is what you are looking for, then go visit a gentlemen’s club! You are sure to find the dirtiest girl that will perform tricks that will be seared into your mind’s eye forever. You want to see, hear, and smell things that you may never experience again in your lifetime. You want a trained female stripper who not only knows what you like, but how to give it to you. The girl that is most likely to perform this ultimate strip show does not look like a supermodel. Ordering from a website that shows all playboy model quality photos should throw up a red flag to you.

Tip #7 Hire more than one stripper.

Sure, that’s what we want you to believe because we want more of your money! Actually, stripper no-shows do happen and is very depressing. It will suck the air out of any party regardless of how much fun was had to that point.

Tip #8 Order your Tampa exotic dancer weeks in advance.

The most experienced strippers are in the highest demand and their schedules fill up quicker than less requested exotic dancers. Not only should you book your entertainer a month in advance, you should also schedule him or her earlier in the evening so that they are not late coming from other parties.

Tip #9 Use an established stripping agency that knows Tampa entertainment.

Business owners can post any start date for their business that proves they have ‘experience’. You cannot hide the fact of when a domain name is registered. This is public record and can be easily found. If a company can lie about their age to deceive customers into trusting them, what wouldn’t they lie about?

Tip #10 Recognize that some Tampa male exotic dancers perform male revue shows at local clubs.

Some, but not all guys may be a part of a monthly special revue show that can fall on the date of your party. If your heart is set on a specific male then go see him dance onstage! For a more intimate lap dance, change your party date.

Wow, you actually read all of these tips! Hope this does not scare you from ordering because private party strippers offer you that once-in-a-lifetime experience which can never be seen with any other Tampa male dancer.

The following article Tampa Male Dancer is republished from HB Strippers Agency Service Blog HB Strippers Adult Entertainment

[ryantsumrall]

Tampa Male Dancer

Top 10 Tips Hiring a Tampa male dancer.

Are you looking to host the wildest private party including some of the hottest exotic dancers Tampa has to offer? Look no further because when it comes to hiring the best Tampa strippers for bachelor or bachelorette parties use Hunks & Babes when only the best will do. With many rookie party planners booking their first exotic dancer in Tampa, it is important to utilize the following tips to ensure both parties are happy and your night is successful.

You can use one or all of these tips when ordering adult entertainment for your private bachelor, bachelorette, or birthday party. If anything, this information will give you excellent insight into an unfamiliar adult industry.

Tip #1 Spend time and thoroughly investigate the company you wish to do business with.

Here’s a big secret: A Tampa male dancer is an independent contractor who is free to work with any adult agency they choose. Ordering private party strippers online is not regulated or monitored by any group or agency and most likely never will be. It is up to consumers like you to report any wrongdoing or misrepresentation to social media or complaint websites. However, when researching your favorite online stripping agency, please keep in mind that reviews both good and bad could be written by competitors instead of real customers.

Tip #2 Compare photos of dancers in different regions within the same company website.

Newer agencies that try to expand into other cities they do not have coverage in copy and paste their exotic dancers who only work in one city. The same stripper who works in Chicago obviously can’t work in Las Vegas, but online stripping agencies have the same dancer for you to choose from. Employee turnover is also fairly high so you run into the risk of ordering a stripper who no longer works for the company.

Tip #3 Look for improper grammar, misspelled words, and mismatched exotic dancer stage names.

Most prices for ordering exotic dancers are competitive and do not fluctuate immensely. However, the overall cost of hiring a private dancer is expensive and premium quality service is expected. What kind of service should you expect from a company that does not maintain the quality of their own website?

Tip #4 Research using search engines and type in the company name or stage name with city.

It is common to use Google or Yahoo to research reputation and reliability. Most customers do not consider actually typing in an exotic dancer’s stage name + Tampa. You may be shocked to find the female or male stripper you’re looking at is actually much older than the pictures provided or that they work for multiple agencies. You may find comments on the actual dancer themselves and get a good grasp as to the authenticity of their entertainment. See if you can find the timestamp on the most recent comment and if it is longer than one year, chances are that guy or girl does not work anymore.

Tip #5 Find reviews or social media comments on each Tampa male dancer you’re looking to order.

To coincide with tip number four, you may stumble across the Facebook page of a Tampa stripper. Of course these pages can be monitored and changed to mold the desirable image and gain more business. It is difficult to create hundreds of fake profiles and like your page or even write detailed comments. There are even stripper LinkedIn profiles that you can look over. Be careful just like ordering entertainment off of craigslist, you do not know who are want will show up at your door to your event. Please use social media only as a method of research and not for contacting the exotic dancer. There have been cases of police sting operations arresting non-suspecting customers using nonconventional websites to hire disguised escorts. Just be safe and order from Hunks & Babes. None of our dancers escort and pass a rigid quality standards test.

Tip #6 Uncover the truth about Tampa female exotic dancers.

If you’re having a Tampa bachelor party and planning on having the hottest girls parading around in their sexiest lingerie, you might be correct. The breathtaking supermodel type strippers that rate over the 10+ scale usually are not doing toy shows for cheap tips. The upper echelons of exotic dancers know they do not have to get nasty dirty to get your money. They will work at the busiest Tampa strip clubs to maximize their exposure to as many hungry men as they can. Guys will empty their wallet simply to just be in the presence of this dream girl. If this is what you are looking for, then go visit a gentlemen’s club! You are sure to find the dirtiest girl that will perform tricks that will be seared into your mind’s eye forever. You want to see, hear, and smell things that you may never experience again in your lifetime. You want a trained female stripper who not only knows what you like, but how to give it to you. The girl that is most likely to perform this ultimate strip show does not look like a supermodel. Ordering from a website that shows all playboy model quality photos should throw up a red flag to you.

Tip #7 Hire more than one stripper.

Sure, that’s what we want you to believe because we want more of your money! Actually, stripper no-shows do happen and is very depressing. It will suck the air out of any party regardless of how much fun was had to that point.

Tip #8 Order your Tampa exotic dancer weeks in advance.

The most experienced strippers are in the highest demand and their schedules fill up quicker than less requested exotic dancers. Not only should you book your entertainer a month in advance, you should also schedule him or her earlier in the evening so that they are not late coming from other parties.

Tip #9 Use an established stripping agency that knows Tampa entertainment.

Business owners can post any start date for their business that proves they have ‘experience’. You cannot hide the fact of when a domain name is registered. This is public record and can be easily found. If a company can lie about their age to deceive customers into trusting them, what wouldn’t they lie about?

Tip #10 Recognize that some Tampa male exotic dancers perform male revue shows at local clubs.

Some, but not all guys may be a part of a monthly special revue show that can fall on the date of your party. If your heart is set on a specific male then go see him dance onstage! For a more intimate lap dance, change your party date.

Wow, you actually read all of these tips! Hope this does not scare you from ordering because private party strippers offer you that once-in-a-lifetime experience which can never be seen with any other Tampa male dancer.

 The following article Tampa Male Dancer is republished from HB Strippers Agency Service Blog HB Strippers Adult Entertainment