It's that wonderful time of year where we meet with family (either by birth or our chosen family) and friends and stuff ourselves with as much food as possible. Everyone knows about Turkey for Thanksgiving, but did you know there is a cruelty-free and healthier way to do it with a Tofurky Feast? It's the way I've been celebrating for 15 years. I love it! In this month's issue we cover ways to stop unwanted email, whether or not to spend on Black Friday, and how to upgrade your AVG anti-virus software - the free version is not expiring.

Happy Holidays !

Eliminate SPAM for the next year, Part III (Final)

We've covered better and better ways of removing spam in our 7/27 and 10/20 issues. Both methods cause minimal inconvenience and do not overly inconvenience our clients, prospects, friends and family.

Here are some stronger methods which have a high probability of success, but require a bit of adjustment by your email recipients:

1. Change your email address. This can be costly (reprinting businesss cards and stationery and brochures), but it's quite effective. When people send to your original email address, they get an automatic message that tells people to call you (don't list your new email address) to get your new email address. With this change, get an email address with your own domain name (like joe@joytotheworld.com). We sell and manage these for a reasonable price at www.iwantadomainname.com.

2. Sign up for a free Gmail/Hotmail/Yahoo email account to receive any subscriptions, sales or newsgroup info. These services handle spam well and you should never have to check the spam folder. If you have even the slightest hint that you could be spammed - give potential spammers people this email address rather than your primary email address. So, you have one email address you can use for your mobile device (the changed email address) and one you can check when you're in front of a computer.

3. Don't ever use info@, sales@, comments@, webmaster@ email addresses. The spammers know about this and hit every domain name with these.

4. After changing your email address, remove all instances of email addresses from your website.

5. If you want folks to contact you from your website, the best method is to put a non-clickable email address on this. You can also use a form, but make sure to use a very sophisticated one that is guaranteed spam-proof.

6. Don't accept all emails from @joytotheworld.com. Only accept ones you set up. Have an automatic message set up for all other addresses to call you at your phone number.

I'll be compiling all these suggestions - part I, II, III into an eBook for sale in the next 4 weeks which will elaborate on all items, as there are plenty of nuances to the suggestions I've given. By following all 3 parts, I've reduced my spam by 99.9%.  For about 2 years, I did not receive a single piece of  spam. Now I get about 2-3 spam/day.

It’s the holiday season; do you know where your holiday cards are?

(These are NOT ecards - they are hold-in-your hand, you don't have to print them holiday cards that are sent to US postal mail addresses)

You say it every year to yourself, "I should really send out holiday cards." But then you say, “It’s such a hassle!” Well, guess what?? Sending cards just got easier! We now offer a convenient way to:

1. Enter names in your database from previously existing address information on your own PC in programs like Excel, Outlook, Act and more.
2. Upload your own personal photo to be printed on the front of a card. Add a cool holiday border around the card (like a Christmas Wreath, Hanukkah Menorah or Red wrapping paper).
3. Upload your personal message inside the card with your own handwriting and signature.
4. Have each holiday card be personalized “Dear Clyde…”
5. Send to all friends, family, and business associates with the push of a button. Stamped, Sealed, Mailed via the US Postal Service, and delivered to their postal mailbox anywhere in the world.

All of this holiday card sending is done from the privacy of your own home. The greatest thing about these cards is that you can sign up and the next day we can send your holiday cards - from 1 to 1,000,000 cards!

Want to know how to do it? Just call me, write me, or fill out the form at http://www.sendcardswithease.com/index.html and in 15 minutes, I’ll show you how you can send out that special holiday card, including postage, for about a $1.00/card.

To spend or not to spend - that is the question

Before I jump into the orgy of spending, what about not spending anything?? The official site is fun-filled. Here's some more ways not to spend money. How 'bout surfing the web all day and do Internet Window Shopping - try using a Mac - that would be an interesting twist!

 

It's always been a crowd favorite, the Black Friday issue...time to start spending!! Black Friday is the busiest shopping day of the year - the day after Thanksgiving. The name Black Friday comes from being a very profitable (black) day - not being in the red (losing money). Have fun!!

One shopping guide from MSN . A more fun one with tons of ads - in PDF and HTML forms that you can download to your desktop.

Great, Great Reason to Boycott Wal-mart. You should be able to get the same or better stuff at Target, which actually has a great community support program, helpful people and inventory that is in stock.

Black Friday stuff you can order now - Ships on Black Friday. A great site - very easy to navigate. Another one - unbelievable deals!

Me, I'm leaning toward the "Buy Nothing Day." Happy Shopping!!! (or not)

We have installed AVG software, the free anti-virus software, on many of your computers. The program has been telling you 7.1 will expire in January and to update to 7.5. The reason for the update is that 7.1 is not Vista (the new Operating System by Microsoft) compatible. The large button is for you to purchase 7.5. There is also a small link where you can upgrade to 7.5 for free. It's great for both Linux and Windows. If you are tired of Norton or McAfee sucking up all your system resources, try AVG for free today. Speaking of free software, we now have Blink, a free firewall. Give it a try today. I'll be testing it against the free Zone Alarm firewall and reporting the results in www.clydesblog.net.

Hope you enjoyed the ride....

Clyde Lerner, In The Moment Computing Phone: 408.732.8500 E-mail comments/feedback to: http://www.itmcomputing.com/contact_computer.php

Join ClydesBlog.net

This is the way to join my blog, so you can see updates on a regular basis: Go to www.itmcomputing.com – put your email address in on the right column where it says “Subscribe to Clyde’s Blog."

Use the power of the Internet to create a paper greeting card and send it in the mail without leaving the comfort of your desk! Request a free gift account and I'll show you how to use this remarkable relationship-building tool. www.sendcardswithease.com

This newsletter is a service of In The Moment Computing and is Copyright 2006 Clyde Lerner. All worldwide rights reserved. If forwarding, please forward all of e-mail, not any portion therein. To see past issues of This and That Computer Tips newsletter, please visit the web at: http://www.itmcomputing.com/newsletter.php and click on "Archives."

 

©2006 In The Moment (ITM) Computing. All rights reserved.