Social Media Explained

Social media is now an essential part of doing business. That does not mean you need to be on every social media platform to get results. Ideally, with one or two focused networks, your message can reach your target audience in no time.
The question is which ones to use and how to maximize your visibility.

If you are clear about your social media goals, it will not be a challenge to determine which channels would work best for your business. Thing to keep in mind when you are deciding - Where are your customers? Before you think of creating your business profile on a site, you need to think: Are my customers here? There is much variation in the demographics of social networks and you need to find out where your customers are so you can reach them effectively.

According to a Pew survey in 2015:

• Facebook has wide, global usage, but fewer young people are staying active.
• Instagram is a favorite among teens and young adults.
• Twitter is home to many information junkies and tech savvy people.
• LinkedIn has higher income, educated professionals.
  
• Pinterest has a user base which is 80% female dominated, most of whom have a higher income background.
• Google+ is a network with a predominantly older male user base.
• Vine is also a youth oriented platform.
• YouTube has an equal number of men and women, but men are more active users with wider preferences.

Instagram — art, food, retail, lifestyle
Twitter — news, gossip, tech updates
LinkedIn — B2B, recruitment agencies
Pinterest — Retail, DIY, culinary skills, art
YouTube — Luxury products, DIY, Home improvement, music,
Google+ — SEO, IT

Sushi vs. Sashimi

Sushi means 'sour rice' and does not always feature fish.
Sashimi means 'raw' - but is not just fish.

Background Sounds

This simple site provides some ambient sounds to soothe your soul as you scramble around the internet. There are also apps for iPhone and Android to take the sound with you. It has birds, rain, waves, fire, thunder, and more. Now you can think pleasant thoughts with pleasant sounds in the background to keep you company as you do your work or surf the net. Alas, there was no bacon sizzle sound. LINK

Scientific Proof Isn't

There is no such thing as scientific proof. Scientific evidence is evidence which serves to either support or counter a scientific theory or hypothesis.


Proof is incompatible with science which, by its nature should be provisional and self-correcting. Karl Popper (generally regarded as one of the greatest philosophers of science in the 20th century) once wrote that "In the empirical sciences, which alone can furnish us with information about the world we live in, proofs do not occur, if we mean by 'proof' an argument which establishes once and for ever the truth of a theory." Only Math has proofs.

Free Friday Smile

Happy Friday

Happiness cannot be accumulated, but it can be divided.

I always try to share a slice of happiness while enjoying a Happy Friday!

Most Important Crops

The order varies by study, but these are generally agreed to as the top ten crops harvested, not by revenue. Cannabis is the top revenue producing crop and sugar cane is the most popular.


They are, in order, Corn, Wheat, Rice, Potatoes, Cassava, Soybeans, Sweet potatoes, Sorghum, Yams, and Plantains.

National Hospital and Health-System Pharmacy Week

It is celebrated Oct 20-26. Pharmacists are the unsung heroes of the medical system. They keep doctors honest, and patients as well as possible. They are the last stop before a patient ingests something that can do great good or grave harm.

Laser Razor

Here is a new invention that has been a long time coming. It was a kickstarter campaign and garnered US $4 million. The goal was $160,000. If it makes it, a whole industry will change forever, just like it did when Gillette came up with the disposable razor blade. This one is non-disposable and requires a battery to operate.

Kickstarter has suspended funding because it is, “in violation of our rule requiring working prototypes of physical products that are offered as rewards.” Should be fun to watch for the next round. See for yourself at LINK.

Email Study Results

A recent study by USC Viterbi School of Engineering researchers found that speed of email responses depend on a variety of factors including age, platform, volume, and timing.

The paper, "Evolutions of Conversations in the Age of Email Overload," was presented at the World Wide Web Conference. The paper is the largest study of email to date, measuring how the volume of incoming email affects behaviors of recipients and the length of time it takes them to reply to emails. The study was conducted in accordance with privacy standards: individuals opted in to the study, the data was anonymized, and the emails were not read by humans.

The researchers said ninety percent of people respond within a day or two of receiving an email to which they plan to respond. Half of responders will respond in just under an hour.

Age is also an indicator for email response time. Younger people reply faster, but write shorter replies. Teens were the quickest, with an email response time average of 13 minutes. Young adults aged 20-35 years responded on average of 16 minutes of receiving an email. 35 to 50 years tended to respond in 24 minutes, on average. Those over 51 years of age, on average took 47 minutes to respond.

Women typically respond four minutes longer than an email response from a man. The platform also plays a critical role: If someone is working from a laptop, on average it will take them almost twice as long to respond than if using a mobile phone.

Emails with only five words are the most common. More than half the email replies are less than 43 words, and only 30 percent of emails are longer than 100 words.

Younger users can cope with the increased email load more than older email users. When younger users become more overloaded they tend to send shorter and faster replies to cope with the increased load. On the other hand, older people respond to an increased load of emails by replying to a smaller fraction of emails.

It is no surprise that people are more active on email during the day than at night. Emails on weekends get shorter replies than weekdays. If you want a longer and perhaps more thoughtful reply, email someone in the morning. The researchers found that emails sent in the morning tend to get longer replies than those in the afternoon.

Wine is Better than Exercise

A recent study found that a glass of red wine is the equivalent to an hour at the gym. Also, drinking red wine could help burn fat, says another study.

The health benefits of red wine have been well documented. Studies have revealed that those who drink a glass of red wine a day are less likely to develop dementia or cancer, that it is good for your heart, it is anti-aging and can regulate blood sugar.

Research conducted by the University of Alberta in Canada has found that health benefits in resveratrol, a compound found in red wine, are similar to those we get from exercise.  Resveratrol was seen to improve physical performance, heart function and muscle strength in the same way as they are improved after a gym session. Other sources of resveratrol are blueberries, peanut butter, red grapes, and dark chocolate.

Segway Causes Segway

In 2010, Jimi Heselden, the mufti-millionaire owner of the company that makes Segway motorized scooters died in an accident while riding one of his vehicles.

He was riding a rugged country version of the two-wheeled Segway when he lost control of the machine as he traveled along a bridleway close to his estate near Boston Spa, West Yorkshire. He was found dead in a river after plunging 80 feet over a limestone cliff. The Segway was found in the river near his body, indicating that he was still riding the scooter when he drove over the cliff.

Segways are banned on British roads for safety reasons, but are legal on private land. Heselden bought the Segway company nine months earlier and planned to further develop the machine.

Free Books Online

Thought I would share a few sites that offer free books for your reading pleasure.

• http://en.childrenslibrary.org/ Find award-winning books and search by categories, make believe books, true books, and picture books
• http://www.lookybook.com/ Access children’s picture books and books about philosophy and religion.
  
• http://www.bored.com/ebooks/ It has has music ebooks, cooking, over 150 philosophy titles, and over 1,000 religion titles
• http://www.ideology.us/ Works by Rene Descartes, Sigmund Freud, Karl Marx, and others.
• http://e-library.net/Religion.htm Read books about the Bible, Christian books, and more. Plays From Shakespeare to George Bernard Shaw and more contemporary playwrights.
• http://www.readbookonline.net/ Here you can read plays by Chekhov, Thomas Hardy, Ben Jonson, Shakespeare, Edgar Allan Poe and others.
• http://www.fiction.us/plays.htm Read Pygmalion and more.
• http://shakespeare.mit.edu/ All of Shakespeare’s comedies, tragedies, and histories
• http://vl-theatre.com/list4.shtml This site catalogs plays available in full text versions online
• http://www.publicbookshelf.com/ Romance novels, mysteries, and more
• http://www.ibdof.com/ Fantasy, graphic novels, anime, J.K. Rowling, and more
• http://www.free-online-novels.com/ Christian novels, fantasy and graphic novels, adventure books, horror books and more
• http://www.foxglove.co.uk/free_online_novels.html Free novels, satire, and short stories
• http://www.baen.com/library/ Find books by Scott Gier, Keith Laumer and others
• http://www.roadtoromance.ca/freestories.htm Books by romance novelists.

Doctor Codes

"Doctor" codes are often used in hospital settings for announcements over a general loudspeaker or paging system to avoid panic or endanger a patient's privacy. Most often, "Doctor" codes take the form of "Paging Dr. _____", where the doctor's name is a codeword for a dangerous situation or a patient in crisis. These are used in the same way as code blue, code red, etc., are used

Doctor Brown:  To alert security staff of a threat to personnel. If a nurse or doctor is in danger from a violent patient or non-staff member, they can page Doctor Brown to their location and the security staff will rush to their aid. In some hospitals

Dr. Allcome: Serious emergency. "Doctor Allcome to Ward 5." indicates all medical staff not presently occupied are needed.

Dr. Firestone: Fire in the hospital. If a fire's location can be isolated, the location of the fire is included in the page, e.g. "Paging Dr. Firestone to 3 West" indicates "Fire in or near west stairwell/wing on third floor" (William Beaumont Hospitals, MI).

Dr. Pyro: Fire in the hospital. "Paging Dr. Pyro" indicates a fire and its origin or current location, e.g. "Paging Dr. Pyro on 3" means "Fire on third floor" (Kaiser Permanente, system-wide).

Dr. Strong: Patient needs physical assistance or physical restraint. "Paging Dr. Strong ..." indicates that any physically capable personnel (orderlies, police, security officers, etc.) in the proximity should report and be prepared either to move a patient who fell down and cannot get back up or to capture and restrain an uncooperative patient.