Free converter – make a file a PDF

I really like pdf files.  The reader plugin is widely available, and the file usually looks presentable, it’s easy to print, etc.  However, the cost of buying a good program to convert your files into a pdf can be quite prohibitive, then it might not handle all the file types you need, too.  Well, if you aren’t going to convert gobs of files and the few files you do need to convert are less than a MB, then you are in luck.  Neevia Technology has a free, yes free, online PDF file converter for you to use.   For those once-in-a-while needs, it is great!!  Thanks Neevia.

website graders – that’s a joke, right?

My peeve is with sites like websitegrader.com, which, while they can supply you with some valid information and advice, are not able to tell you the ‘marketing success’ or ‘ marketing limitations’ of your site.  There are gobs of information out there about your site – if you know where to look.  And yes, most of the information can and is used when judging how well a site markets.  But key factors that are not available to the general public that have a great influence on the effectiveness of a site are either 1) not available to machines or 2) cannot be assessed by machines.  

Don't put your brain in a jar.

You can have the best ‘grade’ for a site, but if it’s so ugly or so user unfriendly that no one wants to be there, it doesn’t matter.  Likewise, if your site is beautiful, but has no SEO or SEM, it won’t get many looks because no one knows it’s there.  

Machines also make mistakes that humans would not normally make.  Websitegrader.com didn’t ‘find’ my contact form, even though it is linked through menus, content and a sitemap, with no mystery meat involved.  Therefore, it dinged my grade.  Even if it did find my contact form, how would it know if it were being used, and being used by humans, not just spam bots?  It wouldn’t.  Only the human looking at the form output would be able to say with accuracy that true conversions are coming in via the form.  Further more, to know if you are getting a ROI, it would need to know what you invested in the site and what you’ve invested in marketing, along with the calculated returns from the site.  I hope this information is not available on the Internet – it shouldn’t be.

My synopsis is that these sites like websitegrader. com offer a non-service service.  The real goal is for them to get you to buy their marketing services.  Kinda like an auto mechanic that offers free engine checks – and invariably finds things to fix.

Is your social-media-life scattered all over the web?

Organizing and keeping track of all the sites you belong to, calendars, lists, information on visited sites, blogs you write, and other sites you frequent is becoming increasingly difficult with the web 2.0 craze in full swing.

Before it all goes spiraling out of control,  try

SuprGlu

Use it to create one place for others to find all your stuff.  I use SuprGlu by adding all my personal feeds to make one Supr RSS feed of all my stuff.  Or use it to create one place to gather all your favorite feeds.  The feeds don’t have to be yours – you can create a Supr feed of your favorite tech sites, or maybe your favorite recipe sites, it’s up to you to conglomerate the feed into what you want it to deliver.

Then there’s

Scrybe You can’t get into this, the beta is closed, but see the video here.

Polarizing Effects of Technology

Ignorance of technology will be the downfall of many people in the near future. Those that have failed to keep up with technology, and I don’t mean end-user functionality, will be at the mercy of those that do. It is not enough to have access to the web and know how to use a search engine, these are activities that are guided by the technology; you are just going through the flow chart. The people that can guide the technology instead of being guided by it, creating and altering the flow chart, will be polarize us all into two groups; strangely enough there are already names for the groups: white hats and black hats.

If you collect stray animals, give the homeless your spare change, and want to do your part to bring a little peace and understanding to the world by being a good example, then you fall into the first category of those that want to help. I’m not against helping people, as you might assume from my somewhat derogatory depiction. But rather, I find it to be an over whelming, frustrating job. Trying to educate people enough to make them the least bit secure while online is just about futile. If you turn off all the wonderful bells and whistles that web sites offer, the web becomes a rather boring flat place for average people. We have become accustomed to the conveniences of automated processes. Time needs to be spent on tasks that most computer users find a ‘waste’ of time, since they don’t notice anything wrong in the first place. They only complain when their browser homepage is mysteriously reset or their screen is covered with pop-ups. Software helps, but it costs money and is in no way leak-proof. I have learned that people are going to do what they want, especially when they don’t understand and can’t perceive the consequences.

People don’t believe there are sharks in the water until they have been bitten, and by then, it is way too late to start complaining.

Those that belong in the later group know who you are. You know that 99% of the population have no idea what you do, how you do it, or that you are doing it at all. If society can’t conceive of what you do, how can they tell you’ve done something wrong, never-the-less prove it in a court of law filled with people that can barely email? Other than that, all I have to say is no comment.