Online Registration Services How to Select the Right One

With dozens of online registration companies to choose from, selecting one is not an easy task. We recently went through several sites and found ourselves somewhat frustrated and confused.

We want it to be easier for you to select an online registration provider because you have a lot to gain from making the switch. In this paper we will help you understand what to look for and which questions to ask when selecting an online registration provider?

What do I look at first?

First impressions say a lot about a company. If it is easy to obtain and understand information about their service, then it is more likely that their product and company are easy to work with. If it takes too much up-front effort on your part, then it may be a sign of what?s to come.

How responsive were their sales people to your calls or emails? Did it take hours or days to hear back? Did you like interacting with them? How clear were their features and pricing? Did you get straight answers, or need to really dig to get to the bottom line? As much as you are buying technology, you are buying the people who make the technology and their ability to make your life easier.

How do I determine which system will be easiest to use?

Most providers will talk about their ease of setup and use. Depending on your technical aptitude and the complexity of your event, you may or may not agree with their claims. Something to consider: the simpler a system seems at first, the less likely it is to have advanced functionality that you may quickly hunger for. When you look at a system, it?s important to consider both simplicity and functionality. If you go with a very simple system for eases sake, you may miss out on some important functionality or vice versa.

The best way to truly understand ease-of-use is to play around with the system yourself. Most companies have a demo account where you can log into their system and setup or play with a registration form. When you do this, ask yourself? Is the interface intuitive? Can I figure out how to do most of what I want to do with it? Would my coworkers be able to understand and use this system? Sometimes you can also get a sense of the system through their live online demos. It?s best to see the live application in use, versus a PowerPoint, to show you how the system works.

If you have relatively complex registration needs, you will need a system that is more robust and therefore may appear less simple. In this case you will want to pay greater attention to their training and support (which we will cover later).

What is the easiest way to figure out if they really have the functionality I need?

An easy way to check if their functionality fits your needs is to fax your current registration form to the salespeople. Make an additional list of your management and reporting needs and identify them as either ?have to haves? or ?would like to haves?. Ask the salesperson to walk through it with you and tell you what their system can and cannot do.

A great way to confirm their claims is to ask for and call references that have events that are similar to yours. This way, you can talk through how they used it and compare it to your own needs. Ask the references what functionality is missing and how easy it is to use.

Most systems cover the basic functions like collecting information, sending confirmation, reminder, and notification emails, processing credit cards, and producing basic reports. However, it?s the advanced features that are important to identify and compare. Some of these include wait listing, hotel blocks, custom reporting, mass emailing, surveying, and series meeting management. Within each one of these categories, there are a host of increasingly specific functions to consider.

If a provider is close, but doesn?t have the exact functionality you need, some companies also offer customization services (for a fee). You tell the company what you need, and they?ll tell you how much it would cost to customize their system to better meet your needs.

How do I know if the company will be there for me when I have questions or problems?

Support falls into three categories: online help, training, and one-on-one phone and email support.

If the online help is good, it will be the most efficient way for you to get quick answers 24/7. How easy is it to access? Is there context sensitive help that will give you help specific to the section you were in? How thorough and practical is the help? Do they offer how-to?s, tips, and warnings? How often do they update the help? Updates are especially important with companies that are improving their technology on a weekly basis. Do they provide regular email updates on enhancements or changes? Some companies also offer flash mini-trainings that you can click on to watch at any time.

The next is training. What trainings do they offer? How often? Is there a charge for training? Do they have flash trainings that you can take whenever you like? What do customers say about their trainings?

As well as some of the systems are built, you most likely will have questions or needs that require a live person on the other end (especially if you don?t have time for online help or training). The important questions then become: What is the average response time to an email or phone call? How helpful and friendly are they? How many clients per dedicated support employee (non-programmer) do they have? Do they have restrictions on how you can use support (email only, $ per incident, etc.)? Try asking the support team directly for the answers to these questions. The way they respond will tell you something too.

With some providers, they will build the registration pages for you (for a fee). If you are in a pinch for time or find it a hassle, this can be a life-saver, so be sure they have it.

How do I figure out the real bottom-line cost?

Unfortunately, pricing is one of the most confusing aspects of this industry. This has come as a result of providers trying to tailor their pricing to too many different client needs. Small events, large events, frequent events, processing credit cards, etc.. Here are the categories of pricing: per event, per registrant, % of transaction, annual fees, up-front fees, flat rate licensing fees, and additional service fees.

Mix all this together with volume discounts and long-term contracts, and there are a lot of numbers to look at. To sort them all out, start with a most likely scenario of what your events will look like for the next year and get the prices for that.

Create a spreadsheet and input all the numbers from the different providers to come up with a bottom-line price for each. Then weigh the total cost against all the other criteria discussed here. Don?t make the mistake of going with the cheapest at the expense of missing out on features, stability, or good service.

Also, be careful with entering long-term contracts, just to get a better price. It is important to do a test-run with a couple events before locking into the long term (if at all). Some agreements have auto-renewal clauses that, without you really knowing, lock you in year-to-year.

What do I need to know about processing credit cards online?

If you are using their merchant account, how does billing work? How quickly do they pay you? Do they hold back on any portion? If so, for how long? Can you view real-time transactions? How easy is it to do refunds?

If you are using your own merchant account, do they support your gateway? How long does it take to connect up? How do you do refunds?

Pricing for merchant services can be confusing as well. If you are trying to decide if it makes more sense to create you own merchant account or use the providers merchant account, consider the following: If you use your own merchant account you will pay monthly, per transaction, % of transaction (plus their hidden non-qualified rates), as well as monthly, and per transaction gateway fees, plus whatever fees the registration provider requires for integrated processing. All totaled, you may be able to save a percent over if you used the provider?s merchant account. You need to weigh the potential savings with the hassles that go with setting up and managing your own merchant account, gateway, and all their fees.

How do I know which company I can count on to be around for years to come?

How long has the company been around? How many developers, support, and sales people? How long has it been profitable (if at all)? How is it funded? What is their employee turnover? What percentage of new business is from referrals?

A company that has a healthy percentage of referrals usually means they are investing well in their technology and people. As a result, they have a greater likelihood of being around for the long haul. Online registration has changed many people?s lives for the better, and created some great testimonials. The question is what percentage of the customers are raving fans? How consistent is the company and its technology with making people happy? One good way to find that out is to ask? What percentage of new business is from referrals?

What aspects of security and stability are important?

Is your information safe? How secure are their servers? Who has access to your information? If you will have multiple users or administrators accessing the system on your end, do you have the ability to set different security access levels?

All systems have down time (including the Yahoo?s and Amazon?s of the world). The question is how much? There are several factors that cause this: the internet, the host, the hardware, and the software. Be sure to ask how many times in the past year has the system gone down, and for how long? NO ONE has zero downtime. So, ask for specifics if they say rarely or not at all. What advanced notification do they give for downtime. What guarantees do they offer for uptime?

Will the technology grow with my needs?

A huge benefit of using an online registration provider, instead of hosting your own application, is the ability for the provider to make constant upgrades to improve the system. Which brings us to our next question, How committed is the company to improving their technology? How frequently are they making upgrades? Ask for the upgrades that were made in the past couple months and compare the amount of enhancements between systems.

How do I get my information out of these systems?

Reporting enables you to monitor ongoing progress of your registrations, plan for the event, and then manage the actual event. How easy or difficult is it to access the information you need? Do the standard reports give you what you need? Can you produce your own custom reports? Can you sort the reports the way you want? Can you save and export reports? When you demo the system, check to see that the reports will give you what you want, the way you want it.

We hope you found this paper to be valuable in helping you select an online registration provider. No matter who you choose, it will make you and your staff?s life easier and events more successful by taking and managing registrations online.

I sincerely hope this article makes your conference and event registration even more successful!

Bill Flagg is the President of RegOnline
Putting smiles on the faces of over 9,200 event-planning professionals worldwide because it is the easiest-to-use online event and conference registration system available.

P.S. - If you would like to receive more tips like this via email then go to http://www.RegOnline.com/eTips

Building a Wireless ISP Network....The Opportunity

In the US, most of the people have one or more broadband access services to choose from - variations of DSL from multiple vendors and cable. That is if you're in a metropolitan area. For more rural locations your choices are limited....if you have any at all. Therein lies an opportunity for those willing to pursue it.

In the rural areas of the country, the selection is limited. Satellite is available to anyone (at high cost), but between dial up and T1 there are no options for many residents. Satellite suffers from latency, making it unsuitable for VoIP and some other real time Internet services. Some applications that should not be sensitive to latency (email, Web forms) will perform poorly or fail due to the increased packet time.

The traditional carriers (RBOC) and resellers face a cost issue in bringing broadband service to outlying areas. Without a concentration of users the per user cost at published rates causes either a poor or negative margin. The way cost accounting is done in larger corporations makes the business case worse for a large carrier. Cost allocations between departments for such things as floor space, personnel, and backend support end up as added costs rather than leverage opportunities. Traditional wired service will not reach outlying residents unless mandated by law, and the trend is against this happening in the near future.

So the opportunity is open for a business offering Internet broadband access service to outlying residents.

Therein lies a tremendous opportunity.

Now....just how do you go about taking advantage of this opportunity, filling a need, and building a wireless ISP network?

To assist you with working through the planning and execution of this effort here are some insights and resources you should consider:

* Business Continuity Planning - This isn't the technical side of the business, the backup systems, redundant pathing, fail-over and restore, or alternate location stuff. Here you're looking at subjects such as Legal Structure, Personnel Insurance, Asset Insurance, and Process and Procedure.

* Revenue and Profit - Covers where and how to create your income including installation, basic monthly service, custom access service, volume or corporate pricing, other services, business partnerships, usage based service, civic service, and tower leasing (or you could build and probvide your own).

* Security Issues - There's much to consider in this arena. Don't overlook it.

* Bandwidth issues - The access line to your tower(s) is likely the critical factor to success. Whether it's a T1 or a DS3 line. First off, it probably represents your single largest operational cost. Next, it determines the maximum quality of service you can provide.

Quotes you receive for bandwidth will probably be very different in terms of cost and performance guarantees, and should cover Performance Standards, Service Availability, Mean Time to Respond, Mean Time to Repair, Latency, Packet Loss, and Jitter. To help you search for the best match provider for your bandwidth requirements....I recommend utilizing the services of an unbiased independent broker by submitting a RFQ request to DS3-Bandwidth.com.

Here are some additional resources that may be of benefit to those developing a WISP....or thinking of it.

StartAWisp.com

WISP Centric

There's also an excellent forum for discussion of ideas and issues between WISP owners and potential developers at DSLReports.com.

Final advice....think strategically taking care to consider the business areas hilighted above. Do make use of an independent unbiased broker for the bandwidth decsion. Also, apply the resources shared here as well as any others discovered from your own research.

Michael is the owner of FreedomFire Communications....including Business-VoIP-Solution.com. Michael also authors Broadband Nation where you're always welcome to drop in and catch up on the latest BroadBand news, tips, insights, and ramblings for the masses.

Searching for the Right ISP

When searching for the right ISP there are a number of items to look at. How much is it going to cost me? What is the connection like? What are the Features? Is it available in my area? You will soon find that there are many ISP?s to choose from. So, it is beneficial for you to pick the right internet service provider.

The cost is probably the most important aspect to most subscribers. Yet, many are not willing to put up with the low quality provided by free ISP?s. This leaves them looking for low cost ISP?s. The best way to find the lower cost ISP?s is to search for them. Most of the ISP?s you are going to see advertising are going to be a bit higher than those who do not have as much advertising. A search of the internet may help you find some of these ISP?s.

Although the price may be right, if your connection is weak you may not to go with that ISP. This can happen because problems with the cable or phone lines are common with the ISP. It can also occur if your ISP has a large volume of users trying to access the internet at the same time. This is particularly true with dial-up ISP?s that do not have enough phone numbers. Also you want to make sure that the ISP is compatible for the tasks you want to do. For instance, AOL users sometimes have problems with some aspects of the net. This is because the program that runs AOL is so dominating. If you frequent certain sites, they may list ISP?s that have problems using the site. This usually applies to sites that have music, video and effects but don?t really apply to straight text.

The features are also important. In fact, if you don?t want to be frustrated with pop-ups you may find yourself drawn to ISP?s that offer pop-up blockers and virus protection. You may be worried about your children surfing the web. A feature to block adult sites may be what you are looking for in that case. ISP?s are coming up with new features all the time so you really do have some choices here.

Another important aspect is availability. Not all ISP?s are widely available. This is especially true for ISP?s that are free or low cost. Even if an ISP is available in your area, there may not be an available local phone number. When you use your dial-up modem with a long distance number you may incur long distance charges while you are on the net. In addition, if there are local numbers but not many of them, you may have trouble connecting to the internet.

About The Author:

Neil Shevlin is the owner of UK Cheap Broadband which is a great place to find broadband links, resources and articles.

For more information go to: UK Cheap Broadband

http://www.ukcheapbroadband ? Copyright 2005

Please feel free to copy and paste this article and it's resource information.

WiFi Hackers and Netcentric Battlespace Security Discussed

Recently we read about the Hackers annual convention this year in Las Vegas, DEFCON. Indeed there were many people in attendance, including military onlookers who were both concerned about the future and intrigued by the hacking ability and skills of these brilliant and borderline criminals.

In fact the military learned that it was possible to receive a WiFi signal and that someone built a device that could read a signal 125 miles away. This means in wireless technology of this sort is used, whether encrypted or not, the enemy can sense us and locate our transmissions. It is like homing beacon. And before we know they are there they could fire first and we end up with casualties. In the new type of warfare, early detection and accurate firing will win. Just like our Apaches can see those Enemy Tanks and fire on them and they never even saw them?

One interesting issue would be that we could pre-plant WiFi systems in the sand, they think we are there, they fire on a Bluff of a Mirage Blue Force MBF, and we see the firing launch locations and shoot them first. Your basic Decoy city, you see sometimes having extra decoy networks can catch the hackers first, detect, track, identify, capture. So, sometimes having a duplication decoy system, you can use the system to catch the bad guys early on. We could deliver these devices and drop them in the sand via homing pigeon, which cannot be detected and they would turn on, on impact.

Hackers are an interesting group, interesting psychological study. Curiosity seems to be an innate human trait, these hackers are not DUMB PEOPLE. In fact they rank extremely high on IQ tests despite their Hollywood Stereotypes and persona. We can learn a lot from the Hackers, if we will listen and it appears they have everyone?s attention at the Pentagon right about now. Think on this.

Lance Winslow

Find the Best Broadband Provider for You

To find the best broadband provider for you takes some effort.

Like anything in life, doing the research is critical to getting the best product at the best price. And this holds true for shopping for broadband services as well. To find the best broadband provider for you you must know your needs first. Someone can tell you how great a service is for them, but if it?s too much or too little for you, you could be wasting the two most valuable human resources ? time and money.

To find the best broadband provider for you it is advisable to get a good feel for what you will really need from a provider. Do you just need Internet service? Or do you maybe want a bundled Internet and phone service. There are some great deals out there for the latter from companies like Homecall Broadband, Wanadoo Broadband and BT Broadband. These are three very established companies in the U.K., and while fighting for market share from each other, are also being touted for their service and price.

But back to your needs ? are you a home business? Is the service for a company you own, or is it for personal home office use? Answering these questions can help better position your research efforts to find the best broadband provider for you. Once you?ve done this research you will know what kinds of packages you are shopping for, and your will could be a little stronger because you know you won?t need to be talked into something you don?t need, as you?ve done your research.

Now you can talk price with all of the companies vying for your business. Once you get a list of prices, it is best to talk to people who have used the service. If you can, go beyond testimonials you may see on company Web sites. Find out what your neighbors may be using, and even better, find some people who own the same service as you. This could help you weed out the ones who may have great deals, but don?t offer the best service.

Finding the best broadband service for you could be the key to a better Internet experience, and could also save you money on your phone bill as well. One thing is for sure, most people who get away from dial-up for the first time, even if they have a very small bandwidth service, can?t believe the difference. Because of the success of broadband services in the past few years, it could be very likely that dial-up service will eventually become extinct around the world. Especially since broadband deals are so good now, and becoming more and more affordable each day for the average person. But again, finding the right one for you is key to having a better Internet experience.

About The Author:

Neil Shevlin is the owner of UK Cheap Broadband which is a great place to find broadband links, resources and articles.

For more information go to: UK Cheap Broadband

http://www.ukcheapbroadband

? Copyright 2005

Please feel free to copy and paste this article and it's resource information.

Get Set Go Web 2.0

A few years ago Bill Gates peddled the idea of Convergence. It was the new mantra then that became a buzzword for the Internet Industry. Of course that promised marriage between the Television and the PC/Internet didn?t quite materialize.

Microsoft lost millions in their MSN TV initiative. That was then, now the tide seems to be finally turning. While people may not have taken to the idea of surfing the Internet on their TV screens, they seem to be ready for their PC screens turning into televisions.

Technically you could watch TV shows on any computer with a built in TV/Tuner card since a few years ago. What is now driving the rapid acceptance of the TV and computer coming together is what they call Web 2.0 or the second version of the World Wide Web. Where interaction over the net will rise to the next level. Boring humdrum websites will come alive with sound and pictures. We will have all are daily information served up on highly customized widgets and television and radio served up to us in super clear High Definition. Basically it is everything we do today on the Internet only better.

The stars are clearly aligning themselves for the next step forward. Google and Yahoo have taken initiatives towards video over the net. It?s a start but still has a long way to go. Take for instance Googles new search ability purely for videos. The concept is nice but when the No. 1 spot on their search ranking is ?Girl caught cheating on her web cam? you know we have a long way to go. Almost all the marketing bulletin boards on the net were spinning on the news that Google was going to offer video ads and start taking a chunk out of the television ad industry. While this may be a distant possibility it?s not going to happen any time soon.

The major difference between the TV and the Internet is in their nature of medium. One of the reasons why the promised convergence never happened before is that TV is a passive activity while the Internet is an active one. The television dishes out information, we choose to either receive it or switch the channel, on the other hand on the World Wide Web we choose what particular information we want. We have to go looking for it rather that it finds us. They both fulfill their separate purpose. People will always want and need for passive entertainment. No one can stay wired, switched on and on-the-ball all day and night. Or can they?

Sasha Masand the founder of Indian Voice Overs is an award winning Television Producer who has been part of the Indian media industry for over twelve years.

BT Broadband

Approximately 4 million people in the UK use ADSL with an extra 2 million using a cable connection, meaning 6 million people in the UK have an always-on internet connection. Of these over 1.7 million are subscribed to BT?s broadband package, making them the UK?s main broadband provider.

Back in August 2000 BT first launched its high-speed internet connection to customers. Initially only available to around one third of UK households and costing ?500 a year it was the first step in many to Broadband Britain.

There are currently only 2 ways to connect to ADSL in the UK. Recently a technique called Local Loop Unbundling means you don?t need to have a BT phone line, but at the moment only 1% of people on broadband in the UK use this method. The only other way to connect transforms an existing BT phone line into a high-speed digital line. This is only available with a BT phone line though, so even if you don?t subscribe to BT?s package your ISP still has to pay BT money to maintain and connect your line. Because of this BT has been able to dictate the availability of broadband in the UK for a few years now.

For fear that UK telecoms watchdog Ofcom would break-up the company because they held a monopoly by owning all the phone lines and means to connect to broadband, BT has agreed to offer rival companies access to the ?Local Loop?, which is the network of telephone lines around the country. By doing this BT could stand to lose many customers as other companies can offer their broadband directly and without having to pay BT expenses.

Since the introduction of ADSL in the UK many potential customers found their local exchanges were simply out of date and the lines too old to be able to handle this new technology. Campaigns run country-wide as BT will only upgrade exchanges if there is adequate interest. ADSL is still not available in many villages and more rural areas of Britain but BT is vastly expanding and upgrading its network to try and cover all the country, Broadband is currently available in more than 96.6% of all UK households.

BT?s standard package is 2Mbps with a 1 GB monthly download limit. This means you can only download 1 GB?s worth of content, be it WebPages, music or movies, a month. This is more than enough for typical WebPages, but excessive music downloads will result in your account being suspended or limited for the rest of the month. You can upgrade your broadband to a 15 GB monthly limit for a little extra a month. BT also offers Pay As You Go dialup and unlimited dialup contracts.

BT Broadband also offers a variety of packages and upgrades designed to suit every user. You can upgrade to a gaming account to play xbox and PS2 games online, you can setup parental filters for your children, and there?s protection against spam, junk mail, pop-ups, virus?s and online intruders.

One of the main reasons people will continue to signup to BT is its reliability. They have broken the mould of all ISPs having poor customer service and are incredibly helpful with setting up your connection.

BT are aiming to trail their 8Mbps connection soon, intending it to be in common use by the end of the year. BT?s ultimate goal is making broadband available throughout the country, including rural areas.

About The Author:

Neil Shevlin is the owner of UK Cheap Broadband which is a great place to find broadband links, resources and articles.

For more information go to: UK Cheap Broadband

http://www.ukcheapbroadband ? Copyright 2005

Please feel free to copy and paste this article and its resource information.

How Much Bandwidth Is Too Much For Your Business??

For your company's specific business applications....how do you decide on how much bandwidth will be necesary? Is it T1, DS3, or OC3 or greater? Do you factor in a reasonable overage to account for potential emergent situations? What modeling approach do you use to calculate your min and max load and thus your supportable need range? How do you decide how much is enough?

I suggest to address these issues that you apply an end to end approach. The parts are the workstation, communication link(s), server, database, and support systems (DNS for example).

Next, its important to remember that users do tasks. Any analysis must be based on the task concept. Also, the specific tasks in any application will likely differ by user type so its useful to look at the frequency of specific tasks by user group.

Each task can be looked at in terms of time. The total time is split among the parts. Before worrying about bandwidth, you should determine just where the time is being spent for each task. Don't consider the user action in the task analysis - their keyboard time is best handled with scripts to eliminate that variable, and output is done when the screen is populated or the printout complete.

The communications aspect is impacted by volume of data moved, amount of communications overhead, background load, packet size, protocol, latency, and bandwidth.

While there are many favorite tools to speed the analysis, it can all be accomplished with a spreadsheet, a packet capture tool, and a knowledge of scripting.

There are some generals you can follow for this evolution.

First, while applications vary, most have yet to find the application that improves performance on any task when bandwidth goes above about 750Kb. Most see no improvement once bandwidth reaches 200Kb. Additional bandwidth then becomes an issue of user count. Next, most applications do not suffer performance drops until total average utilization goes above 80%.

The best time to define bandwidth requirements is during application development. The reason is that most applications can be tuned to perform with significantly less traffic while still in development, and the traffic is often a good indication of other problems like poor database structure or less than optimal distribution of work. The second best time is before purchasing an application. Often two similar applications will have significantly different WAN performance characteristics and this can be a key decision criteria.

So how much bandwidth is too much? If you can lease less than you currently have and lower your costs, you have too much.

I strongly suggest that you NOT enter directly into discussions with a bandwidth provider while deciding your bandwidth requirements. They're more likely to be focused on making a sale than in helping you with your infrastructure decisions. Instead, seek the advice of an independent unbiased broker. They can walk you through the process to finding a solution which best makes business sense to you and your organization.

Michael is the owner of FreedomFire Communications....including DS3-Bandwidth.com and Business-VoIP-Solution.com. Michael also authors Broadband Nation where you're always welcome to drop in and catch up on the latest BroadBand news, tips, insights, and ramblings for the masses.

Dial Up ISP

Dial up Internet service providers, or ISPs, are mostly organizations, companies or business that provides people who want access to the information superhighway the chance to do so. People who use dial up ISP are provided immediate access to the Internet through their own telephone lines. All you need is a computer, a telephone line and a modem that serves as the medium and channel between the phone line and the computer. Dial up ISPs provides users Internet connections that are around 56 kilobytes per second, or less.

Dial up ISPs also provide other services ? they are not just limited to dial up access. They also provide Internet transit, domain name registration and domain name hosting. These dial up ISPs are mostly telephone companies, but not all of them are.

One of the disadvantages of relying on dial up ISPs is a slow connection. This sluggishness can be particularly annoying to people who are use to accessing the Internet through fast DSL, cable or broadband subscriptions. The average Internet speed through dial up ISP services is only 30 kilobytes per second, or 50 at most. But many people like dial up ISP because it is less expensive; if you don't need speed, use dial up.

Finding the right kind of dial up ISP for you is not very difficult. However, the thing that you should remember is that, just like deciding on any other product or service, the best dial up ISP is the one that will provides quality service and gives you exactly what you need.

Dial Up provides detailed information on Dial Up, Free Dial Up, Dial Up ISP, International Dial Up and more. Dial Up is affiliated with Dial Up Access Numbers.

SPAM

What is Spam? Well the general consensus is that spam is any unwanted email you receive. Companies get your email address through various methods and then send you an email advertising their product or service. When you look at the principle, what better form of advertising could there be. There is virtually no cost to you except maybe to purchase the list and then to generate the email. You just setup a group of email addresses and chose to send your email to everyone in that group and presto off it goes.

This is probably the cheapest form of advertising you can have. Many companies use it, and they should as a part of their total advertising budget. What has happened is that because it is so cheap every Tom, Dick and Harry use it. Much of the material you receive is unwanted and many times it is objectionable material to the receiver.

A question arises. We have the Constitutional right to advertise our business or service. I think that is called Freedom of Speech. My problem is that much of this material I receive I did not ask for or for that matter do not want. The come back is, so what, just delete it, you don?t have to read it. That may be true, but what if one of my children sees it first. Here in lies the problem.

This article will not solve this issue. The only choice you have at the present time is to use some sort of Spam blocker. Most of this software must be purchased by the consumer. I did not want it from the beginning, why do I have to buy something to stop something I didn?t want in the first place. A discussion for some other time.

If you use Microsoft?s Outlook 2003 there is a spam filter built into the package. That makes it some what easier. There or other spam filters available on the market. You should look into them.

Now the problem I have with spam blocking software is that I must configure it to filter out certain email types, categories and words. I happen to use Outlook 2003. The filter is nice, but I have found that there have been instances that email I wanted was put into the filtered email category. So I have too view each email separately even the ones put into the Spam category to make sure that I don?t miss any email. Using filters require you to periodically reconfigure the filters. Now I ask you, the time I spend first going through the spam filtered email and the configuration time, I have found that if I turn off the filters and just go through each and every email and delete the ones I don?t want takes far less time.

All of my email is opened by me only so any objectionable email I just delete. This may not be an option for everyone. So maybe the filters are better for you.

This is a problem that I suppose will never go away. With the ability to advertise so cheaply there will always be someone that will attempt to circumvent the filters and send the email. No form of legislation will completely solve this problem.

At the present time get out the check book and bite the bullet and buy some form of spam filtering software package. Look around there are many, many out there. Some are good and some are not so good. Ask your friends for recommendations, read a few magazine articles, what ever it takes. The employees at some of the retail stores have some knowledge in this area ask them.

This is one of several articles I have written in the Computer field. I have been in the computer industry for over 15 years. I love it and now I am branching out. Unwanted intrusions to computrs is an area of interest and concern to me. My name is Chuck Stephens and I can be reached at cstep@3rdm.net. No web site or anything to sell yet.

Bandwidth Monitoring

Why should I monitor my bandwidth I hear you say and exactly what is bandwidth monitoring anyway? Ok. I shall explain why we should keep an eye on our bandwidth along with what information we are looking for whilst monitoring. You see a bandwidth monitor can give you the figures, the transfer data rate and many more details such as which programs on your computer are connecting to the internet. Actually only Bandwidth Vista does show you which country you are connected to but the idea of monitoring your bandwidth remains.

Take a look at your bandwidth monitor software program and then connect to your favourite download website. Now take a look at the top speed between you and the remote computer. Keep all other connections closed whilst doing this. The top speed of data transfers, both upload and download makes up your complete bandwidth usage on this transaction. This is an accurate way of testing your bandwidth to a specific location in the world. For instance if you know which country you are connected to then you can quickly work out the speed between your computer and another computer within certain boundaries. Another aspect of bandwidth monitoring is to watch for cost! Yes a lot of users are paying per MB for bandwidth, in fact we all are in a way. Our ISP does have a cap on how much bandwidth can be used. We rarely encounter problems however if the ISP is large enough to flex the line, allowing all users to use as much as they like - to a point anyway. There are many people paying a monthly bandwidth cost, whether it is for their internet connection or for their web hosting, bandwidth is a big issue. The general home user can still make use of a good bandwidth monitor however. For very simple tasks like selecting fastest download servers.

The home computer user should remember that there are also security issues that can be addressed by using a bandwidth monitor. For instance the best bandwidth monitors will alert you to which program has connected to the internet. No point having all those facts and figures if you don't even know which program is doing the damage! If you know which programs are connected to the internet and how much bandwidth they are using then you can make wise decisions as to which programs are allowed access.

James Jenkins
http://www.tamarsolutions.co.uk

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