The Brand, the Pitch, the Market

With the legal lifestyle increasing all around the globe, having professional indemnity insurance is becoming more and more indispensible. If you do not have professionally indemnity insurance built-in into your building insurance, then now is probably the instance to look at obtaining enhanced cover. Here is some suggestions about why you require insurance, and what to look out for. Find a public liability insurance company today.

What is public liability insurance: Professional Indemnity cover is an insurance agreement that shields you from claims that other people may possibly make against you in the chance of an accident. If somebody damages their possessions or harms themselves in or around your property or company then the professional indemnity insurance will protect you for any damages that could well take place. Cover can range from two-hundred and fifty pounds up to ?1 million.

What are you protected for: Insurance will insure you against accidents or loss that other individuals might suffer in or around your house or company premises. You are covered against claims from robbers as well as damages that might well occur to anyone from falling objects or workers carrying out maintenance. If a mishap occurs on your property and somebody claims against you, your insurance contract will help out to pay any costs.

What’s included A few contents or property insurance covers contain in-built liability insurance. You should check with your insurance firm whether this is the case, & what level of protection you have. Even if the insurance is integrated, you must check that you are properly protected for any accidents that might happen.

Premiums: The premiums that you pay depend on the specific type of cover you get. If you just insure your house, then premiums are very likely to be less than if you are wanting to cover a business. On the other hand, premiums are comparatively cheap for the amount of protection that you have to pay for, and it is therefore important for any individual running a company.

Here in England September represents the end of Summer and the beginning of Autumn as well as the start of the new school year and the start of many new initiatives in business, life and lots more besides.

When anyone is looking to make any kind of change in their life, often the approach they take needs to become attractive or appealing in order for them to maintain it and often it may not remain attractive or appealing for as long as we like. I get lots of people that tell me that they find it difficult to maintain enthusiasm or keep on investing the required levels of energy in order to make a real success of a project or a goal.

So, for that reason, I want to talk about enhancing creativity today. When you become more creative, you can begin to make more out of your every day experiences and perceptions of what it is that you are doing, you can make life more colourful and have more fun and joy when you are more creative.

So what actually is Creativity?

Good question. We can all be creative; creativity is about making new connections - and that is literally physiologically true within our neurology. Creativity is the mind’s growing edge. It often involves a lot of discovery. By creating new connections you build your brain power and develop mental and interpersonal flexibility which can begin to heighten your ability to do a huge array of things with more and more ease.

Imagine this; every time you link two things together, you create a third entity. That new connection can itself then connect with other ideas, additional possibilities. Imagine the impact this can have throughout a system like your brain!

Neil Armstrong first stepped onto the moon in 1965. That event changed our beliefs and thoughts about the universe. It also altered thoughts and beliefs about human inventiveness and skill: this event helped us to recognise that if we want something enough, we can find ways to do something that we may have believed to be impossible before. I reckon this gave may people some powerful and liberating thoughts and beliefs about human capability. I heard on the radio recently that there are also plans to land on Mars now! I always fancied being an astronaut.

Being creative on an individual level has the same potential: when you connect things together, you go beyond both of them; and you have the possibility of forming new beliefs about yourself and your potential. I remember when I was first learning about NLP, hypnosis and my other beloved subjects, I was so excited, I would read so much material that I felt like my brain was literally growing and stretching. That’s not too scary is it?

I love working with children. They have such a vivid imagination, I can remember when I used to play football for hours and days on end as a youngster, I was not just imagining scoring in the World Cup final, I really was actually

there at Wembley Stadium scoring that goal, I am telling you I was there! Children are amazingly creative, each of us has been a child (some still are!). Children show their creativity in the way they discover their environment and make their own meanings of it. Many children create new worlds while playing with toys, they don’t need elaborate or sophisticated toys, equipment or props, the meaning comes from within them; the meaning comes from out of themselves.

You need to give yourself permission and time (and energy) to make new connections and links which is what creativity is all about. It is about the process rather than the outcome or the final product. You can be creative at home or at work, when changing habits, updating behaviours, resolving issues, or just making life happier in any way you can. You can be creative with words, ideas, thoughts, materials, food and the kind of fun you have. You can be creative with your surroundings or with your internal world.

In addition to this, creativity creates something new. That’s right, even if every ingredient is already known to you or is familiar. An insight for example, is creative because the new conclusion is gleaned from information you already had; it is the new perspective that makes the difference.

Above all, being creative returns us to that state where we are scoring goals in World Cup finals. It is about being absorbed and enjoying doing what you are doing, paying attention to detail, having a grand vision, being excited and playful, wondering what would happen if…

Adam Eason is a UK based consultant, speaker and best-selling author. Please visit his website for a vast range of resources from the fields of hypnosis, NLP, personal development and human potential and to receive your amazing, free, instantly downloadable hypnosis session for ultimate relaxation: www.adam-eason.com Thank you.

Most of us can think of people in our lives, with more experience than ourselves who have supplied information, offered advice, presented a challenge, initiated friendship, or simply expressed an interest in our development as a person. If we think long enough most of us must admit we have had mentors even though we may not have called it ‘mentoring’ at the time. Very often our first mentor was our parents or other relative who taught and demonstrated for us some essential knowledge or understanding that we needed.

The term “mentor” has its origin in Homer’s Odyssey when a man named Mentor was entrusted with the education of the son of Odysseus. In modern times, mentoring is associated with a variety of activities including teaching, counseling, sponsoring, role modeling, job shadowing, academic and career guidance, and networking. Mentors can be helpful in just about any areas of your personal development. However, this is especially true when it comes to achieving your goals whether they are personal or in any area to which you are new and inexperienced.

In today’s environment of changing technology and evolving complexity, a good mentor can help us by growing our abilities to grasp the success and security we seek. Success comes from persistence. Persistence often comes from the support and encouragement of a mentor.

A mentor is also important in those times when our thoughts are not crystal clear and we can be diverted from our goals. A mentor will coach us to greater awareness. The mentor will help us achieve increased clarity of purpose and help us focus on the tasks we need to accomplish. A mentor will help us develop personal strengths and achieve a sense of well being which often translates success.

The purpose of mentoring is also to help you pay attention to your intentions and get to where you want to be. Learning what we don’t know helps us to understand why we do what we do. As we become more self aware, we can begin to consciously choose to do the tasks that lead to the success we desire.

As effective mentor seeks to help you answer fundamental questions, like “Who am I?” and “What is my purpose in life?” The answers to these questions help us become action-oriented instead of waiting for something to happen to us.

In a nutshell, a mentor is important for the following reasons:

Motivation - Knowledge - Opportunity to work with a professional - Trusted advice and counsel - To be challenged in a safe environment - Practical know-how - Guidance - Sponsorship - Support - Personal Development in a non-threatening environment - Empowerment - Encouragement - Self-confidence - To help you stay aware of what you need to do and how you do it.

Do you need a mentor? If not, it is probably time for you to be a Mentor.

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sports bet usa com

Almost all gamblers should have learned of the caption “offshore sports betting” by now, though many of them maybe aren’t wholly clear on what that symbolizes. An offshore gambling website primarily works extrinsically to the supervision of any distinct nation on the other hand it could also be a web based gambling site which places its main computers inside the boundaries of a nation where internet based playing of games of fortune isn’t at this time prohibited. In short therefore, it’s best delineated as a sports gambling establishment doing business independently of the authority of the area of the clientele. Web based sports gambling internet sites are all modulated with the help of 3 institutions. These are dubbed the OSGA (the Offshore Gaming Association), IGC (Interactive Gaming Council) and the Fidelity Trust Gaming Association (the FTGA).

The OSGA is in fact an unbiased “watchdog” body that watches the modern offshore gambling business, their purpose is to offer the public the means to easily identify trust-worthy internet companies to play games with. The Offshore Gaming Association endeavors to protect consumer’s rights, additionally they don’t demand any joining dues. The OSGA are a professional not to mention unprejudiced third party association which asserts nonpartisan viewpoints, indicated by your feedback, unprejudiced inquiry, chats, inside prompts and additionally supplies industry information.

The Interactive Gaming Council are a non-profit-making administration. The organization was established to allow a forum for interested individuals to address topics and in addition to advance communal matters in the worldwide online sports betting trade, to establish just and level headed industry standards and systems that endeavor to enhance end user certainty in web based gaming commodities and functions, also to help as the industry’s generic strategy advocate and it also offers an info clearinghouse.

The IGC have built a distinction for honor, fairness and also believability due to the ethical standards it establishes, and its allure to commercial enterprises of exemplary ethics. The Interactive Gaming Council influences overseas sports gaming through advocating a characteristic ten-point standard procedure manual and also bills sports gaming business concerns license fees to feature their logo. Dissatisfied bettors may furthermore mention any of their challenges to the Interactive Gaming Council.

The FTGA was established in a venture to present a benchmark which will raise the standards of on-line sports betting operations. The council think that by partnering solely with credible internet sites, they are able to shape an affiliation of the most ethical and most competent internet betting operations multinationally.

There are agencies who regulate the conduct practised by web based gambling and which should serve to relieve most of the concerns felt by gambling buffs. Live gaming internet sites are entirely trustworthy, in that individual details aren’t a requirement also the returns and the odds should be just as balanced and reasonable as in a regular Vegas-style sportsbet. They lower traveling costs, but retain of a Nevada gambling casino, however today you can game in your house.

As far back as I can remember, I have always had an intense desire to explore and investigate the way things are, with a view to discovering what new thing(s) could be developed. This usually meant that I sometimes found a need to challenge traditional ways of thinking and/or doing things.

That offended many people.

Unfortunately (for them), I was never someone who feared confrontation. I’m not sure how this will come across to the reader, but if I were to be honest, I would say I usually feel better, and perform at my peak, when I know that most people around me do not agree with what I’m trying to do. I honestly often get the motivation to do something which others say is not possible, but which I believe in, just from the knowledge that they don’t think I’ll succeed!

How does this relate to worrying that someone will steal your idea? A lot I tell you! The truth is that whenever I expressed my new ideas to those around, most people simply reacted by disagreeing. Few would try to really consider what I had said/proposed in an objective light. In fact, some would say they understood me, and then proceed to try and make me “see” why what I was proposing was wrong!

So, you see, when you come up with YOUR idea for a business, oftentimes, only you might see the idea in the way you see it. No one else (or VERY few others) can possibly see it exactly the way you see it - and even those who see what YOU see would NOT be capable of thinking about implementing it EXACTLY the way you intend. That’s where - and why - you’ll always have the edge!

Evidence that the above is true abounds in society, and even influences story lines used in movies - which in truth, quite often mimic real life occurrences in society. For instance, the “evil genius” in a movie, who wants to own the secret of the new formula being developed by the “famous” chemist finds it necessary to kidnap the latter and force him to work in a hidden fully equipped laboratory until a breakthrough is recorded.

Very rarely will you find a person who has a bias for “ideas theft” willing to expend “intellectual glucose” to independently arrive at the potentially value end s/he suspects another person is aiming to arrive at. Such people are just too mentally lazy - and are always on the lookout for shortcuts to getting what they desire.

That’s also why they CANNOT steal YOUR idea. Even when you hand all that you know to them, they still would not be able to take it and run to the finish line. The simple reason is: they lack the unique insight into the subject, and would really struggle to understand it the same way YOU do, talk less of implementing it the way YOU would. The implication: they would not be able to get the results you could. In essence, they cannot really “steal” your ideas successfully from you!

The reason why the foregoing happens is that you are unique as a human being. And depending on how well you have trained your mind to work, you will be able to take your idea and implement it in a way that only you could possibly conceive.

Yes, it is true that this line of thinking or argument is not fully applicable to all situations. In certain cases, it is logical that the first person to get into the marketplace might reap the greatest rewards. However, it is also true that many times someone has entered into an existing market, and carved a very profitable niche by doing what others are doing a bit differently, and in a way that is difficult to copy. An example is Fred Smith’s overnight delivery service idea - Federal Express (Fed Ex).

As I said earlier on in this article, that’s where - and why - you have the edge!

So, stop worrying that someone is lurking around trying to steal your ideas. Don’t fret when you learn that someone is trying to launch a new product or service that (appears to be) similar to, or exactly the same as that you are about to start. They cannot think about(or implement) it exactly the way you would.

By all means take every possible precautionary measure to protect your work from prying eyes, and maintain as much confidentiality as possible about it for as long as you deem necessary. However, DO NOT let the thought or fear of others doing something similar to what you are doing “paralyse” you.

Remember at all times, that except they can gain direct access to the thoughts that you have about your work so as to discover how best to go about developing and implementing your idea, they CANNOT possibly do it the way you intend to, or as well as you would.

You owe it to yourself to develop and implement your unique ideas to the fullest possible extent. Don’t deny yourself - and the rest of society - of the opportunity of adopting a new way of thinking and/or doing things, that could change all our lives for the better, possibly even forever. So take action to start that new business today, or work harder to develop that new idea or invention. It might just be what the next revolution the world is waiting for.

FINAL WORDS: If you still have any doubts about whether you have what it takes to take your idea to great heights, maybe the words of Thomas Edison can encourage you to believe more in yourself:

“If we all did the things we are capable of doing, we would literally astound ourselves.” - THOMAS A. EDISON

Self-Development/Performance Enhancement Specialist - Tayo Solagbade - works as a Multipreneur, helping individuals/businesses develop and implement strategies to achieve their goals, faster and more profitably. Download your copy of his 25 Articles Ebook from http://www.lulu.com/content/268555. You get full reprint rights for each article.

Visit Tayo’s Creative Business Solutions(CB Solutions) mini-site - http://www.cbsolutions.v27.net - to learn how you can get affordable Freelance Writing, Rapid Website Design/CGI Automation, Website Marketing Strategy Development and Custom MS Excel VB Spreadsheet Automation Services.

The courts have once again upheld that the religion of Darwinism (i.e. evolution) is the only religion recognizable as true and teachable to our children. There was a time when this type of edict from government to the people would have been heavily frowned upon and might well have been met with loaded guns pointed at those that attempted it. But not today.

As the school system in this country has migrated away from its roots of community and church control to county, state and even federal control things that are often frowned upon (i.e. the teaching of religion under some guise of “separation of church and state”) is accepted as the norm. The criteria used to justify it is simply can their be enough of a shroud to conceal it as “science”.

Let’s not be coy. Darwinism is a religion. It has all the major qualities of such. It is, as Webster’s Dictionary defines, “a cause, principle, or system of beliefs held to with ardor and faith”. There is no proof of evolution on the macro scale but merely faith that it exists. On the micro scale you have what can best be described as adaptation but still very little in the way of one species miraculously morphing into a new one.

Bacteria reproduce so fast that you can observe thousands of generations in a relatively short time. And still there is no recorded evidence of a rose springing forth from a petri dish. Heck there isn’t even evidence of a rose ancestor appearing!

But now the courts said that a school district in Dover, PA even mentioning Intelligent Design as an alternative to Darwinism was unconstitutional. Pretty good way to ensure only the religion of choice gets exposure no?

Darwinism is only a theory. It is not science fact. Something else the Darwinists don’t like pointed out either. Webster’s also correctly defines “theory” as “a plausible or scientifically acceptable general principle or body of principles offered to explain phenomena ” or “a hypothesis assumed for the sake of argument or investigation b : an unproved assumption”

In fact Darwinists hate having to recognize evolution as only a theory so much that they are fighting another battle to keep stickers off of text books that remind students of this in Cobb County Ga. The stickers read simply (and correctly) “This textbook contains material on evolution. Evolution is a theory, not a fact, regarding the origin of living things. This material should be approached with an open mind, studied carefully, and critically considered.”

But we cannot have that either! And the reason is because Darwinism or the “Origin of the Species” fails one critical test. That critical test is there is no starting point.

Most arguments with an evolutionist break down as you walk them back through their theory.

“Where did life currently on Earth come from?” Darwinist: ” It evolved from species that previously existed.”

“Do you have evidence of this?” Darwinist (if he/she is honest): “Not hard evidence but we have a fossil record from which can suppose this. Yes there are many anomalies evolution doesn’t account for and yes we don’t have ‘intermediate’ species but it works in theory.”

“Fair enough. So where did those species that previously existed come from?” Darwinist: “They evolved from a common ancestor.”

“And the ‘common ancestor’ came from?” Darwinist: “It formed chemically and spontaneously through chemistry in the primordial ooze.”

“And the primordial ooze came from?” Darwinist: “It formed after billions of years and after the Big Bang.”

“And what is the ‘Big Bang’?” Darwinist: “A super dense ball of matter exploded creating all the matter that currently exists.”

“And where did this super dense ball come from?” Darwinist: “Uh … um … huh. Well I guess that it had just always existed or was created out of nothing.”

Please note the last line of that. It either always existed or it was created out of nothing. Sound familiar? It should because it is basically the same starting point you have with recognized religions like Christianity and so on. You cannot prove it. You simply accept it as faith. God has always existed and he created the universe out of “nothing”.

So what separates Darwinism from concepts such as Intelligent Design? The answer is the guise of “science”. The same guise that made people think for years that the sun revolved around the Earth and that the Earth was flat for that matter.

Listen. I have always been candid about my beliefs when it comes to “evolution”. This belief has always been that I have little doubt that macro-evolution of some form does exist even though it has never been proven. At the same time macro-evolution like all other phenomena follow the rules of science even if we have not discovered those rules to date. And all the rules of science were created when a being that we know as God formed the Universe. God doesn’t break these rules because He doesn’t have to because He created them and allowed for the ultimate scientific principle known as His Word to supercede all other laws.

I believe that evolution exists because it is part of Intelligent Design. And Intelligent Design simply states that there is an Intelligence that guides the way the laws of nature happen. It doesn’t mean “creationism” although many have tried to make it mean such. It simply means that there is something smarter than we controlling the way things work.

And to many people that is a scary thing. Even to many Christians and people of other faiths that should believe the same thing but in slightly different ways.

But try to step away from the accepted principle of Darwinism as the state sponsored religion and there will be Hell to pay until communities and families reclaim their schools and their children.

The most important part of buying a digital camera is making sure that the one you select meets all of your needs.

Digital Camera 101

Better digital cameras uses a chip called a “Charged Coupled Device” (CCD) instead of film. Light enters the camera, through the open shutter, and strikes the CCD where it is converted to digital data before being stored in the camera’s memory.

While that is the simple description, things can get pretty complicated from there.

Megapixels & Resolution

Resolution is a measure of how many pixels are used to make a digital copy of an image. Pixels are tiny dots of light that make up a digital image.

The quality of a digital camera’s image is usually measured in ‘Megapixels’ where each megapixel represents one million pixels.

Here’s how to determine how many megapixels you’ll need depending upon the type of photos you will be taking and what you intend to do with them.

1 megapixel

Almost obsolete, you might still find these in cell phones, PDAs, and desktop “web” cameras. They’re OK if you only intend to email pictures to other people and those people aren’t going to be printing them.

1.1 to 2 megapixels

Only slightly better than the 1.0, this resolution is OK for an average 4×6 snapshot, but it isn’t going to be a production quality image.

2.1 to 3 megapixels

This is the beginning of the decent camera range. You get very good 4×6 images and reasonably good 5×7 images. These cameras are low cost and provide a good platform for beginners.

3.1 to 4 megapixels

You are qualified to say that you have a “pretty good” camera. You get professional quality 4×6 images, real good 5×7 and 6×9 shots, and somewhat decent, but not great 8×10 images.

4.1 to 5 megapixels and up

People will be saying “Hey, great pictures!”. You can count on professional images all the way up to 8×10’s. Of course, as the megapixel count goes up, so does the price.

If you are only going to be viewing your pictures online, such as posting them at a photo site or using them on your web pages, keep your money in your pocket and pick yourself up something in the 1.5 megapixel range.

If you will be shooting pictures that will be printed at a print house, such as for brochures, postcards, etc, then you will need at least a 5 megapixel camera if not higher. Of course, you’ll also need to have a fat wallet or a lot of open to buy on your credit card because, even thought prices are steadily falling, these puppies aren’t cheap!

Once you’ve solved the megapixel puzzle, the rest of a digital camera’s features, such as lens types, storage capacity and shutter speed are pretty routine and easy to understand. You shouldn’t have a problem deciding on those features.

About The Author

Warren Lynch http://www.wlynch.com has been shooting commercial photography since 1979 in Louisville, Kentucky. Clients include Makers Mark Bourbon, Heaven Hill, Yum Brands, GE, Fruit of The Loom and many more highly recognizable brands. Have him make your product more recognizable too.

Sign-up for Photopheed’s Daily Syndicated Newsletter, the Daily Digital Dose and also receive Bi-Weekly Digital Photography Tips and Techniques from Warren Lynch an award-winning commercial photographer . http://www.photopheed.com

Visit his website or call him at 1-502-587-7722.

Non-lethal Goo Concepts have been tossed around by many war planners and Advance Weapon Think Tanks as an alternative to lethal force. Impeding the enemy army advancement and rendering them useless in battlespace has several positives. The logistical supply chains of the enemy are completely stopped. The fighting ability of the enemy is severely limited and may leave no option but surrender or annihilation.

Rather than planting landmines to stop the enemy advancing, we can lay tiger traps of Goo. In places where oil drilling has been going on for awhile all the basic needs are already in the ground. All we need to is to get them to the surface and prepare a catch basin. Let’s take areas such as the current conflicts in the Middle East, where lots of oil drilling has been going on for many years.

Since the Middle East has many oil fields and we have a migration of insurgents problem and the oil company assets need to be defended since they are the most primary targets of our enemy we need another line of border or perimeter security. Such areas outside of the major cities we are defending until the new government can stand on it’s own are also primary targets as well as those who defend them. In those areas, which are prone to insurgent crossing, we should use the oil as a barrier to entry. An idea to defend a region may need to take into consideration some of the available close at hand opportunities. For instance creating a mote like perimeter around a region and filling it with oily, seawater. The oily seawater is already in the ground in many places as it is pumped into underground cavities created when the oil is pumped out. By mixing this oily saltwater and chemical polymer chains to make a “Goo” and then covering the mote with a layer of sand. This can be done easily by digging the mote, 100 feet wide and 10 feet deep and lining it with a plastic bottom. By increasing the underground pressure and drilling down and allowing the salt-water, which has been pumped in, to flow out into the newly dug lined mote, the canal can be quickly filled. Once the mote is completely filled and before any of the oily water moisture evaporates, create a wind or dust storm to cover the “goo” with a layer of sand. Thus you have created a gooey mess covered with sand, which cannot be seen, but provides a barrier to stop crossings. Such a barrier will be able to prevent crossing or be penetrated by surface movement such as Camels, walking insurgents or suicide car bombers. Oil Companies may also wish to defend their assets in this way. The United States government cannot defend all company assets or track down and defend every possible international terrorist target and it is also necessary that the United States stick to protecting Americans, due to costs and readiness to defend against future threats without over extending our resources.

If the Oil Companies are able to defend their own assets and secure the perimeters of their facilities against International Terrorists without such things which have been determined to be inhuman such as landmines or the outright shooting any trespasser for fear they might have hostile intentions, the human race is better served. If we can keep out insurgents as we complete our Nation Building post-war efforts, then those peoples will create their much over do democracies and experience the freedoms they need much sooner. By securing borders in this way we can prevent loss of US and Iraqi security forces today and protect other free nations in the future, by assisting them to better protect themselves, without the wasteful expenditure of life on either side, which propels further reciprocal responses and revenge motivated behavior. Such a tactic as an alternative to landmines makes a lot of sense.

A system of gooey motes will provide that all those who come into the cities go through checkpoints. Sonic pre-detonation devices can be pointed at all vehicles coming within 500 yards of the checkpoint to detonate any explosives in any vehicles approaching checkpoints. Thus we eliminate all incoming bombs and prevent checkpoint car bombs.

Motes built around airport perimeters where a shoulder launched missile could be fired could prevent an International Terrorist from getting close enough to get off a good shot at any commercial or military craft. With enough advanced warning, altitude and maneuvering speed our military aircraft can use anti-missile devices and chafe to prevent a hit. Motes built around oil company assets or parallel to pipelines also provides a large level of cushion against potential attack.

In defending an area against invasion the advancing forces will be forced to go a certain way, thus making defense much easier and the outcome in your favor more predictable. As the US has superior air power, once you force your enemy into fewer and fewer options and linear based tactics, the game is usually over very quickly. The goo is much harder to cross than water and with no bridges available it makes crossing nearly impossible. Those who try are stuck and out of the game. Trying to go around puts them exactly where you want them for an easy kill and since the goo is covered over they have to keep guessing where to cross, each time risking the loss of more vehicles, camels or troops.

“Lance Winslow” - Online Think Tank forum board. If you have innovative thoughts and unique perspectives, come think with Lance; www.WorldThinkTank.net/wttbbs/

By now you have no doubt read no less then six zillion warnings about “phishing”. (See definition below)

Sorry to test your patience, but here’s yet another one.

I have a small presence on eBay selling art prints and posters. A hundred years ago, (maybe I exaggerate a little), I had three gallery/frame shops that I sold to someone that wanted them more then I did. About a year, maybe two years, back I decided I wanted to see about all the hype surrounding eBay. Truth be known, I also wanted to use it as an excuse to get back into the art business. Conversely, I reestablished a number of old contacts with some of my friends and associates in the publishing business. That is when I set up my eBay Store.

One of the things I quickly learned was that these “phishing” thieves must think I am really dumb.

Since the first month I opened my store, I have been getting phishing emails. Lately, the number I get has increased to as many as 5-6 every single day.

These thieves must be making money on the scam. It must be working, and there must be some people out there that are falling for this. Otherwise, why would they keep doing?

I get not just “look alike” but copies of email forms from these people that are identical to the legitimate forms from eBay’s new email system. To be honest with you, I cannot tell them apart and do not even try. I just delete them. I don’t read any of them. I don’t even click on them beyond what it takes to delete them.

One of scams they run is sending an email saying they have bought one of my prints. They claim that they have paid for it but that I have failed to deliver it to them. And there’s the “Respond Now” button right where it should be. The trouble is it does not go to the legitimate eBay site. It goes to a phony site that these thieves have set up. If I were to click on it and log in, they would get my ID and Password which would give them full access to my account. To compound this, they are using the same information on their PayPal account and who knows how many other sites.

Same thing goes for PayPal.

I have had a PayPal account that goes back a year or so before eBay bought them out. To this day I have never opened an email form PayPal.

There is a simple solution to what is becoming a growing problem - don’t do it! Don’t fall for it!!

If these people want to contact you, they will do so from inside you account. Incidentally, PayPal is a bank, and like any bank account you have to track the transactions, check your balances, deposits, and debits… “Balance your check book” every month. I do this, and to this day I have not found one penny unaccounted for in a legitimate fashion. Although I do have some doubts about the three drivers I bought on eBay that still can’t find the fairway on Saturday.

Keep in mind, it doesn’t take a genius to set-up (steal) someone else’s page lay-out. And anyone can attach any URL address to any form or set of words and letters.

Just because it says paypal.com doesn’t make so.

Phishing

A method of identity theft carried out through the creation of a website that seems to represent a legitimate company. The visitors to the site, thinking they are buying something from a real business, submit their personal information to the site. The criminals then use the personal information for their own purposes, or sell the information to other criminal parties.

Investopedia Commentary

A classic example of phishing is an identity thief setting up a website that looks like it belongs to a major bank. Then, that thief sends out many emails that claim to be from the major bank and request the email recipients to input their personal banking information (such as their PIN) into the website so the bank may update their records. Once the scammer gets a hold of the needed personal information, they attempt to access the victim’s bank account. -dictionary.com

Floyd Snyder is the founder and former owner of Executive Advertising, Camera Ready Art and Strictly Business Magazine. Currently he is the owner of Strictly Business Magazine at http://www.sbmag.org, TraderAide.com at http://www.traderaide.com/ and eBay Store FrameHouseGallery at http://stores.ebay.com/FrameHouseGallery.

The only reason some people enjoy success while others fail is because those who succeed persist in holding the vision of what they want.

They succeed, in the first place, by creating a vision.

Then they persist in that vision. As it sinks deeper into their minds, it becomes a driving obsession. It becomes their most cherished value. And they spend all their time in trying to materialize that value. This drives them to training themselves to achieve their goal.

Most people believe that success is a result of a realized talent. Talent is what people see. They see a bewildering array of skills and concludeincorrectlythat the talent made the person brilliant. Others attribute it to motivation. Again, this is the effect, not the cause that arises from a vision.

I contend that talent is cultivated from vision, and that as vision deepens, as action toward learning and implementation proceeds, skills develop and accumulate. The end result of numerous small skills is a prowess or flair for doing something that we call talent. Personal development happens incrementally, in small quotas, in chunks.

How did Albert Einstein become the greatest thinker the world has ever known? What is the wisdom we can gather from looking at his success story? How did a patent office clerk achieve success as a celebrity? The simple answer is that he was a genius. He had more brain cells. He had more ability to think.

Yet a history of young Albert Einstein showed that he was not a brilliant student. In fact, his teacher once sent a note to his parents suggesting that he was wasting time attending school.

And as for geniusthere have been many, many talented, brilliant physicists and mathematicians.

What Albert Einstein had was a vision. He was driven by an indefatigable curiosity about the nature of the universe. When he was 16, he imagined what it might be like to ride the waves of a light beam.

From this vision, Albert Einstein developed powerful inroads into his ability to envision things in his mind’s eye. His thought-experiments deepened in clarity and precision over many years. They reached such intensity that they accumulated into insights that answered in a most unorthodox way the riddles of physics.

Later, when he died, it was found that he had an enormous preponderance of brain cells that most normal people did not possess.

It is my contention that just as a muscle that is constantly exercised, his brain developed extraordinary connections and fusions over a lifetime of intense usage.

Albert Einstein became a genius because he held a vision. His skills at right-brain cognition developed over many years created such a preponderance of insights that he just had to discover how the universe glued together.

In a similar way, every one of us can develop remarkable capacity in any field if we just hold the vision long enough, shun distraction, and persist in our ideal despite everything that comes our way to throw us off our chosen path.

The journey to accumulate a thousand skills begins with developing the first one. Progress comes from sustainability of vision.

You can be what you want to be if you hold it long enough and ferociously enough to overcome all obstacles. And, in the end, what you will gain will be exponentially greater than the sum of all your efforts. It, in fact, be a true quantum leap.

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Saleem Rana got his masters in psychotherapy from California Lutheran University, Thousand Oaks, Ca., 15 years ago and now resides in Denver, Colorado. His articles on the internet have inspired over ten thousand people from around the world. Discover how to create a remarkable life

Copyright 2005 Saleem Rana. Please feel free to pass this
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