Video Editing Simplified Training Tutorials

It is no secret that video is such an important part of our everyday lives these days.  People in their personal lives are shooting videos with their camera phones, their flip cameras and their digital recorders of every size and description.  Life is flying by and no-one wants to miss a minute of it.  With families spread out over the country…grandmas & grandpas, aunts and uncles, mothers and fathers…and friends can all be a part of those precious moments.  That doesn’t even address individuals who use video for business; which increasingly is important to online marketing/advertising and branding.

Businesses who use video to get more online traffic find it to be an effective tool.  Visually connecting with your market is one of the best ways to catch your customers interest.  In fact, your competitors are probably already using video to their benefit.  Therefore, I am sure that you can see the importance of being able to harness the power of video editing.

In fact, video is used for connecting individuals together for business, family and for entertainment.  So, it is important to know how to, not only capture those moments on video…but, to be able to know how to edit those videos effectively & professionally; and, to preserve them in formats that are useful to the increasingly technological world that we live in.

Understanding how those cameras work and how to render and upload those videos can appear to be overwhelming.  Reading manuals isn’t for everyone…some people learn better from training tutorials…To read more go to: Write Where You Are

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Should Twitter Charge Fees?

       Twitter is quickly becoming a way of life for many businesses and folks.  Anytime twitter shows a fail whale…(the symbol a person sees when trying to access Twitter and its service is unavailable) people quickly bemoan the fact that they can’t get on.   🙂  The fail whale doesn’t usually last long…I’ve only seen it a few times; briefly, when it was over capacity with Twitter users.  Twitter is a mini social site that is quickly becoming a large social media site; the idea is to answer in 140 characters or less the question, ” What are you doing?”.   Often, I hear other users say that they quickly become “addicted” to Twitter.   The service has spawned a bunch of books on Twitter etiquette….rules or no rules use.   Reasons for using Twitter is as varied as the number of people you ask…everyone has their own reasons for using it.  Relationships are built online…everyone has equal access to other users…both famous and non-famous users.   The latest controvery of this company which has been in business for approximately 3 years is…should they charge a fee for their services?

         So far, the Twitter service is free.  There is some discussion about whether businesses may be charged to use Twitter in the future.    People are still discovering Twitter and all that it can do.  Many people of course, use Twitter as a social networking service for their personal communication; others, are trying to find ways to use it to brand their businesses.

          Twitter has been uber successful in their goals of creating a mini social networking site.   At the end of 2008, Twitter rejected a bid for purchase by Facebook of $500 million.  To me, that means that they view their value as well over that $500 million; and it means to me that Facebook considers it a huge competitor.  Still, to stay competitive with Facebook as well as other large entities…Twitter will need to make money to stay alive and growing.

           Businesses have to make money somewhere to stay in business and pay their own employees.  Do they raise funds by putting advertising on their service, by charging for upgraded services for business accounts, or maybe charge a membership fee?  What do you think?  Do you use Twitter?  What are your thoughts on this subject?

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Donny Osmond Announces His Competitive Side-On Dancing With The Stars!

      Donny and Marie Osmond were taping a show with comedian Bonnie Hunt when she asked him if he ever considered following Marie on Dancing With The Stars.  Donny grinned and said that he was seriously considering it and then he said, I guess I let the cat out of the bag.  That sounds like a confirmation to me…although, I dont think the contestants have been formally announced for this upcoming season of Dancing With The Stars.

        I dont know how ABC will feel about the premature announcement…but if it is true that he will be on Dancing With The Stars…then I think it will be a fun season.  Remember that Donny sort of did some impromptu interviews behind the scenes when Marie was on. 

        Marie is famous for her witty sense of humor and her ability to razz her brother…all with the trademark Osmond grin.  It will be fun to watch that competitive nature come out between brother and sister.   Not to mention, it gets me wondering who else will be competing against Donny.   Also, wonder who will be Donny’s dancing partner…which pro?  Julianne Hough won’t be back this season last that I heard…so it will be interesting to see this season’s premiere.  Best of Luck Donny ( I am sure Marie will say that you are going to need it!  >wink< >wink<)

Update:  Donny has c0rrected the impression that he gave that he would be on the upcoming season.  He says, he plans or is shooting to be on the fall season of DWTS.

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High Traffic Scores

       Yahoo… I am so excited.  I did a little test on this blog site on www.HubSpot.com.   I got a score of 48…which they say means that, out of the hundreds of thousands of sites that they have tested, my blog scores higher than 48% of them in terms of marketing effectiveness.   Whoooooo Hooo. 

         But, i am a bit confused.  I am not a marketer.  I just write a blog on all kinds of interesting subjects (at least they are interesting to me).  However, I have written on so many subjects…that evidently, i have hit upon enough various subjects to be effective! 🙂  Cool Beans, I say. 

         Technorati has given me a rank of 372,003 which puts it in the top 0.53% of blogs that they track.  Yes…but, how can this be?  I am not a very technological person.  I only started blogging about 16 months ago.  There are things that I have discovered, which would now cause me to do a few things differently were I to start up another blog…but, that is how I know that I am growing and learning.  That is alright…that knowledge can be applied to future projects.   There is so much more to learn.  It is interesting…but learning new things leads a person to discover new passions.  Before long, you start accumulating large amounts of information that crosses over into other projects or areas of interest in your life.

         If we knew everything when we started out trying something new…would we ever push ourselves to go a little farther?  Probably not, human nature wants to be on familiar ground…to feel confident and comfortable in what we do.  However, the most personal and professional growth comes from pushing yourself to test your mettle…doing something that you do not think you are capable of doing.  I never thought i could do something like write a blog; and have someone come to it, and be interested in what i wrote.  But, i discovered when i gave myself permission to do it for myself…then, i was able to follow through. 

         Everyone tells me that it is simply because of content…regular, consistent postings that the blog is growing.  Writing is fun, reading the interactions in the comment section is rewarding to me.  Touching on subjects that can inform, or, share information is exciting.  Getting to know regular readers is the best part; because, they start to share who they are and what is important to them.  Some of the readers even post things that make a difference in someone else’s life…such as the comments on triple negative cancer…or, suicide prevention; or, some other post that affects people in a real personal way.

         It is a challenge to find something in everyday life that gives a small glimpse into what is happening in the world at that time…trying to make sense of how it affects me or others, that I care about.  Still…reading the report on the rankings of the blog…was eye opening to me.  That is because that isn’t why I started to write the blog; however, it is encouraging to learn as i go… and find ways to improve what i do.

        On top of that…my blog received a Google page rank of 4; but, now that i know it has room for improvement…i want to make it better.   A four is not too shabby.  But, what really excited me was that in the area of traffic…the blog was in the top 4.61% of all websites. 

        This, is like winning some kind of award; such as an Emmy, or an Oscar…maybe a Tony; Is there some kind of award for someone addicted to blogging?  hahahah.  Ahhhhemmmm, I would like to thank my mom, and my dad, and my teachers, and my bus drivers, and anyone else who NEVER let me talk when i felt the need (just kidding) ….LOL     Blogging is fun….Go check out your website rating on www.HubSpot.com.  It is a great tool to work with; if you are in the hopes of improving your site and making it more effective by reaching the people you most want to communicate with.  Find out what you are doing right…and, oh by the way, did you find out anything that you could improve from testing your site on Hub Spot?

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Sarah Palin-Saturday Night Live-In Person

       Sarah Palin will be making an appearance tonight on Saturday Night Live.  This is a show to watch as the talented Tina Fey has been impersonating her on the show for a few weeks.  I think they will have worked out a wonderful skit. It will be interesting to see Sarah’s sense of humor shine through; with all of this campaigning…things have been a bit tough on her image.  Will it help Sarah’s image or will it further the impression that Tina Fey has been putting out there for the masses to mock?  Rest assured the appearance will be plastered all over the political programs on Sunday morning and on the news programs…no matter which way things go on SNL.

       In the beginning of the Presidential candidate’s campaigns…people talked about the Oprah factor…the last few weeks it has been about the impact of Tina Fey’s charaterization of Sarah Palin.  Will this chapter of the campaign trail positively or negatively impact the outcome of the election?  Time will tell…i plan to stay up and watch. How about you?

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It’s Time For Dancing With The Stars!

        In less than an hour, Dancing With The Stars will premiere this years season opener.  It will be a three night premiere.  I can’t wait to see who starts out the season making a sparkling entrance and who will clearly make a splash.  All of this year’s participants are interesting and talented in their own field…so it will be another season of fun…watching them grow and learn. The celebrities are skilled in athletics, acting, comedy and so on…so it will be cool to see them using teamwork with their professional dance instructors to perform each week.  This first week, two yes i said two couple will leave the competition.

        Watch it with me and feel the tension and competition mount as relationships are formed and the competitors become a fraternity with one another.  It seems that each season has it’s own little close knit group. They have fun and challenge themselves and support other couples who they form friendships with.   I wonder if they ever have reunions together?  I think Mel B will be back on this season making cameo appearances.  It is fun to see things through the former competitor’s eyes!  Who are you rooting for and why?

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Olympic Opportunities-Michael Phelps

          Do you remember in the old days when someone won gold in the Olympics; they maybe made the cover of a cereal box or got a television commercial?  These days, with all of the open access to micro media (social networking)…a savy person, or someone with the bucks to hire a  skilled publicist, has the whole world at their feet if they so choose.

           Michael Phelps must be either very savy with the micro media, or he has the bucks for the publicist :).  News came right away that he was going to be working on writing a book.   Keeping his name in the forefront of the media is a wise thing; it will help him to sell his book in large numbers; which publishers love!   He has done the traditional celebratory thing and went to Walt Disney World for a colorful photo op.  He has even been making the rounds in the traditional media mags like People who try to dig into his personal life…like the romance department. 

          Evidently, he has been in training for more than the Olympics as he learned somewhere how to evade direct responses to requests for said information on his love life, haha.  I say go for it Michael…it’s is no-ones business unless you choose to make it public knowledge.  Of course, that doesn’t stop the speculators who suggest that he is involved with a former beauty queen from California, by the name of Nicole Johnson.

           Michael Phelps is also keeping busy by expanding his skill set.  He is going to be on Saturday Night Live on Sept 13th.  It appears that Michael is going to avoid that typical emotional let down, that many feel after competing in the Olympics, when all of the attention shifts from the competitors and their accomplishments to other news of the day.  Smart move…it is never a pretty thing to see a role model who is accomplished, wither on the vine, not knowing what goals to set their sights on next.  Good luck Michael Phelps with your exploration of the world; you seem to be enjoying the experiences as you go, as you should!

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VBS Memories

         Do you remember going to vacation bible school during the summer when you were a kid?  I remember stories, music, games, puppets; and, one memory in particular of a lady that made music by rubbing the tops of glasses that were filled with different levels of water…she was a talented lady!  She could make those glasses sing so beautifully.

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Sex To Die For

        Oh i know, with television commercials touting the latest and the greatest medication to perk up your libido and all…people seem to think that getting ready for love just requires a little extra “help” to make it more intense or to last longer. 

        However, some of those helpful drugs cause more harm than good.  At least, with a perscription those drugs are legal.  What isn’t legal, is making news and it isn’t pretty.  People are dying for the ultimate sexual experience.

        There is an illegal drug being sold that looks harmless; but, is killing people.  It is in a rock form and is being sold in health food stores, grocery stores, on the street and in out of the way smoke shops. It is banned by the FDA but, it doesn’t appear illegal or dangerous.  People often think these types of items are safe…they are not.  Taking these drugs to increase their sexual performance or experience is equal to, sex to die for; because, that is what is happening.

       A man in New York took some of this drug.  He swallowed it even though, i was made to understand that this drug is meant to be used on the surface of the skin.  He was admitted to a hospital because it affected his heart rhythm.  He had severe stomach pains as well.  They could not save him.  He was in his 30’s.  What a waste of a young life.

         This rock is made partially from toad venom.  It is advertised as a love stone, or Piedra.  Authorities are frustrated trying to find the product but it is often hard to discover as it’s packaging is sometimes under the guise of a foreign language.  Desire for a fulfilling love life…has no claim on any one country…it is universal.  People everywhere want that in their lives.  Some are more willing to go to the extreme to get it.

         Rule of thumb is…if you want a sexual experience to be memorable…you have to be alive to remember it!

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Girl Power Rules-Dancing With The Stars

       Girl Power rules on dancing with the stars.  Kristi Yamagucchi and her partner Mark took the championship.  They now have the winning trophy.  But class reins because Jason Taylor and his partner Edyta conducted themselves with style and grace and joy even for Kristi as she won the trophy.

         This season was pure joy watching this group of contestants as they competed.  They enjoyed each other and it showed.  Great job everyone.  Next time though, let’s pray that they cut down on how long the finale is.  Three hours of waiting for the results is a bit much!

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