| This business card makes impression
When Alan Brightman hands out his business card, people sometimes do a double take. His name is on there. So is his phone number and title as senior policy director for special communities at Yahoo Inc. in California. But there also are bumps all over it. Or indentations, depending on the side. The card is far from flawed, though. It's embossed with Braille. ''It almost always generates a 30-second to a five-minute conversation about why accessibility matters,'' said Brightman, who is not blind. ''For me, it's designed to increase awareness.'' The number of people using business cards embossed with Braille is rising, fueled both by an increase in the number of blind people in the work force, and by sighted people giving the cards to other sighted people, according to advocates for the blind and companies that help produce them.
Toral: Companies embrace blogging
IN the past months, I�ve been getting inquiries from companies that want to explore the possibility of having their own blog sites and gain understanding of how this can benefit their business.
I find that corporate blogs can be of value in the following ways:
Extension of a website. A typical corporate website is usually formal or shown in a brochure-type manner. A blog is used to share information casually and to converse with the reader. It provides an opportunity for them to respond and share insights as well. I always suggest that corporate blogs provide a link to all the pages of the company�s website so that it will aptly serve as an extension.
Beyond the product. Every company product has lots of beautiful stories behind them. It can be satisfied customer experiences, product creation journey, events where they participated, and people behind it.
Stefano Zanini – Still on the market
Despite news reports to the contrary, 17-year veteran Stefano Zanini has announced that after a recurring injury and no contract renewal from his 2007 team, Predictor-Lotto, that he is still motivated to return to the peloton for an eighteenth season in the 2008. Zanini spoke with Cyclingnews' Kirsten Robbins about his uncertain future while looking back on the supportive cycling community that lead to the most successful moments in his career. .
Economy makes tax planning harder
NEW YORK: Many small-business owners meeting with their accountants this month and next might find that year-end tax planning and projections for 2008 are a little more complicated than usual because of the uneasy economy. ''We're finding a lot of clients due to the economy aren't doing as well as they've done in previous years,'' said Jeffrey Berdahl, a certified public accountant with Berdahl & Co. in Center Valley, Pa. ''We're not seeing as much of top-line revenue growth.'' For many business owners, that means cash flow isn't as healthy as they'd like. And so decisions typically made toward the end of the year for example, whether to buy new equipment or whether to set up a retirement plan need to be thought through even more carefully. As always, what businesses do for the balance of the old year needs to be considered in the context of projections for 2008.
Austin Music Hall opening with a bang
The new Austin Music Hall is being unveiled at a charity benefit this evening. Direct Events, owners of Austin Music Hall, worked overtime to have the hall, located on Nueces Street, ready for the event benefitting The Health Alliance for Austin Musicians and The SIMS Foundation. "Over many years Direct Events has presented music to and for the Austin community. DE's goals have always been geared towards creating a better forum to present great music from Austin and all around the world," says Tim O'Connor, owner Direct Events. "Our team has created a space that the city of Austin can be proud to call their own." Ikhana, Del Castillo, Bobbie Nelson and Carolyn Wonderland will be performing at tonight's event. The event starts at 6 p.m. and tickets are $10.
Lottery tickets to be sold via SMS
VICTORIANS would be offered lottery tickets via mobile phone under plans from the state's new operator Intralot. The Greek gaming giant's boss, John Katakis, yesterday confirmed plans - first reported in The Australian - to sell tickets in lotteries via SMS. "If it serves the purposes of the game and the player, then why not? Nowadays everybody is using the technology for some purpose to have a better life. It's not what we want, it's what the market wants," Mr Katakis said. The state Government and Intralot's Australian director, Tony Sheehan, have been at pains to play down the likelihood of mobile phone lotteries because of fears children may buy tickets. But the Government included SMS and mobile phone among the distribution methods allowed under the licence and Mr Katakis confirmed the company would be investigating it.
Focusing on core business
ASHFIELD - Aaron, Brian, and Dana Clark grow apples on the same rolling hills as did their father, grandfather, and great-grandfather. The fact that land Herbert Clark purchased in 1886 remains the Clark Brothers Orchard in 2007 is due to a combination of luck, skill, a helpful microclimate, and, in recent years, the same kind of cooperative marketing agreement that seeks fair prices for small Latin American producers selling bananas. After the state's apple industry slipped at the end of the last decade, the Clarks were among several local growers who turned to a nonprofit called Red Tomato for help scouting new markets and raising consumer awareness about locally grown fruit. From 1997 to 2002, Massachusetts lost 1,150 acres of apple-bearing land.
Piggybanks create shortage of small change in China
Beijing, Nov 26 (Xinhua) Generations of Chinese children have been taught to practise thrift by putting their pocket-change into piggy banks. However, the habit, which often continues into adulthood, has caused a severe shortage of coins and small-denomination notes in China. Saving boxes have become a must-have in every Chinese household. In hundreds of millions of these home banks, the Chinese are hoarding a big percentage of the nation's small change. As a result stores, restaurants and even banks are short of coins, according to a Chinese newspaper report. People increasingly discover that their 100-yuan notes are useless when it comes to buying vegetables, taking buses or using public phones - small transactions require small change. Small-change shortage is an annual phenomenon that worsens at year-end.
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