My Video Interview With Alfred Edmond, Jr. (Please Leave a Comment So I Can Win!)
Posted on April 13th, 2012
Yesterday, I interviewed Alfred Edmond, Jr., the Senior Vice President and Editor-At-Large of Black Enterprise Magazine. Alfred and I have Tweeted each other on occasion since our paths first crossed when this blog was recognized as one of the Black Blogospheres Best. Alfreds team invited me to interview him about issues facing entrepreneurs today. I jumped at the chance you know I did.
I jumped even higher when I was told that in exchange for the interview, I could win a trip to the Black Enterprise Entrepreneurs Conference in Chicago in May 2012 if I got the most comments on my post. (So you know what Im going to ask you to do.) But first, Im going to treat you to Alfreds special insights.
Enjoy the conversation, and then scroll to the bottom and leave a comment at the blog to help me win the trip! (Please do not leave a FaceBook comment as they do not count for my entry.
Tags: Alfred Edmond, Edmond
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Free hosting could cost your small business
Posted on April 13th, 2012
Everyone loves free services. Especially for small businesses, the opportunity to stretch a tight budget even further by using a free piece of software is much appreciated.
But in the last few weeks a lot of people have had a wake-up call that free is not always the sensible option when it comes to business.
When the FBI seized the servers of the digital filelocker MegaUpload they did it to combat piracy, but an inadvertant effect of that was wiping out the files of many businesses around the world who legitimately used their service to keep backups.
These files are now most likely gone forever without any warning and there is no recourse at all for these businesses.
Tags: Business, Small Business
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Businesses Show Support for “Pink Slime” Factory
Posted on April 11th, 2012
Leaders of several states will travel Thursday to the only place where the beef product known as “pink slime” is still made.
The trip to the South Sioux City, Neb. plant run by Beef Products, Inc. is meant as a show of support for the embattled manufacturer.
The so-called “pink slime” food additive has come under fire from some consumer groups, prompting several plant closings. Supporters, though, say the company is the victim of a smear campaign.
Tags: Pink Slime, Slime
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Starting Business in Canada on Work Permit
Posted on April 10th, 2012
No. And yes. No, because to legally start a business in Canada as an individual, you need to be a Canadian citizen or a landed immigrant and as a foreign worker here on a work permit in Canada, you are neither.
And of course, as Canada work permits are usually valid only for a specified job, employer, and time period, you would violate the conditions of your work permit by starting a business in Canada. This means that you are not legally allowed to do work “on the side”, or even do other work for the employer listed on your work permit.
Yes, because this doesn’t mean that you can’t apply for immigration to Canada under the Canadian Experience Class of Immigration or apply for business immigration to Canada.
Under the Canadian Experience Class of immigration to Canada, a temporary foreign worker with at least two years of full-time (or equivalent) skilled work experience in Canada or a foreign graduate from a Canadian post-secondary institution with at least one year of full-time (or equivalent) skilled work experience in Canada who has gained his or her experience in Canada with the proper work or study authorization can apply for permanent residence in Canada.
Tags: Permit, Work Permit
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7 of the Best Website Analytics Tools Available
Posted on April 10th, 2012
Ever since eCommerce has started to expand there have been various website analytics tools released for public use by a large number of enterprises. While it is true that most of them are available to be used for free, the question still remains as to which one of them offers the better service and the more accurate data analysis.
Even though you are in no way forced to make use of one service over another, using them all is going to take up far too much of your valuable time; considering that there are only 24 hours in a single day. So here is a little guide which gives an overview of the main website analytics service providers out there
Google Analytics Ever since being implemented in 2006 Google Analytics has quickly become a crowd favorite with the ability to keep track of multiple websites, monitor social network activity, the ability to track mobile phone users, not to mention the ability to measure video traffic.
Tags: Analytics Tools, Available, Website Analytics, Website Analytics Tools
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On the Money: A step-by-step guide to setting up an IRA
Posted on April 2nd, 2012
Do you feel like an IRA dummy? If so, you have company. About a third of Americans have an IRA, and confusion, rather than money, is often what stands in the way of getting started. That’s a shame because IRAs and Roth IRAs are among the easiest ways to turn small savings into giant sums over time. They are much better than bank accounts because the money within IRA accounts, like 401(k) accounts, will grow without being taxed. That’s extremely valuable, so get started by April 17.
THE FIRST STEP: Grab your Social Security number and a checkbook and head to a broker. If you want to stay home, look up a mutual fund company like Vanguard, T. Rowe Price or Fidelity. Tell the representative you want to open an IRA. You will get a one-page form requiring the typical basics: name, address and Social Security number. You will then write a check for any amount between $1 and $5,000.
Tags: Ira
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NASA’s Kennedy Space Center gets message from Hill on cyber
Posted on March 30th, 2012
NASA took some lumps from Congress and its inspector general over the security of its technology systems. But if there is a silver lining to the Hill lashing, the message that the space agency needs to do a better job securing their systems got through loud and clear.
The best way to measure the impact of the hearings is to look at what the NASA centers are doing outside of Washington. For example, Mike Bolger, the Kennedy Space Center chief information officer, made encrypting all laptops a much larger priority this year.
“There is an agency plan to get our laptops encrypted by the end of the year,” Bolger said. “At Kennedy, we had about 500 laptops encrypted and those were users who self identified they had sensitive information on there. Unfortunately, that didn’t work for us.”
NASA has had more than 5,000 computer security breaches in the last two years, according to Inspector General Paul Martin.
Tags: Hill, Hill Cyber
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