A Cup of Coffee---More Than You Can Ever Imagine

 Love you coffee? [Image courtesy of Flikrcc]

This morning as every other mornings, my day would never be complete without a cup of coffee. But this very morning is different, just a bit. What with this morning? Not with the coffee, not with the cup, nothing really except for this by looking in a different perspective.

In my morning routine, I usually sip a good cup of coffee and I'm ready to start my day and get something from the day. Take a look at this perspective, not on why we like to drink a cup of coffee but on how that happens. Think about the hundreds of people involved in bringing us this drink.

The farmers in the field.

Those who sort-out coffee beans.

Those who grind the coffee beans.

The biochemists who made the pesticides (assuming your coffee is not organic)

The workers in the manufacturing department---that include testing, packaging, preparation and anything that will make your favorite coffee available in your favorite department store.

Even the marketers who persuades us (or our moms(or our dads)) to buy that coffee. The director and staffs to make a TV commercial, the advertising companies that sells billboard ads space, newspapers and magazines. If you had a friend who's in Multi-Level Marketing company, then she might persuades you to join her to sell her company's coffee or at least buy what she got. All the gimmicks, promos, freebies and free-taste on the shopping malls. Of course don't forget the online marketers who create FaceBook Page for the coffee companies and any forms of online marketing.

Let's say your the one who buys your own coffee, it is more convenient to buy 'cause there's the friendly cash register always at your service. If you're fond of vending machines, do you know who invented that thing? Well, I don't know either.

If you're always on coffee shop, you will be amazed on how your simple drink came out with different varieties. What is usually hot can also be served cold-ice. The baristas or the bartenders of coffee knows what suits your preference.

The people in higher positions---the company's CEOs, presidents, vice-presidents, stock holders and major investors.

This is strange but I have to thanked all of these people. When you think of that, would anything change? Not really, unless your one of those people(especially my last list of people). But thinking of that would make you more involved with life, more connected, less alone. If you feel alone, look at something and think of all the people involved. We are more connected that we can ever imagine. If you're reading this then we are somehow.

Today in the Philippines, we celebrate Labor Day. So I dedicate this blog post to every Filipino(Pinoy) who work hard for the love of their family, community, friends and God.

P.S. I'm not involved in any coffee company neither do I knew any coffee farmer. :)

101 FaceBook Tips

First things first. You must first have a FaceBook account for these tips be useful. What a dumb condition, of course you do.lol.

Below were the list:
1. Signing up

Your own name You should use your own name or your nickname if people use it more commonly, to sign up. It’s important to ensure that your friends, family and colleagues can find you easily.

2. Your email

Facebook sends out a lot of notifications once you start signing up with various groups and fan pages, apps and even comments. But people can also find you by your email, so you should probably use a personal email account. Check it frequently for friend requests and more. It has to be real though, because Facebook uses it and sometimes your mobile number to verify who you are.

3. Read the terms and conditions

You should always read the terms and conditions on any site, and Facebook is no exception, though, it should be noted that Facebook frequently updates it’s TOS causing a lot of outrage in the community. Know where your rights are and read their documentation.

4. Search your email

In some cases when you sign up for Facebook, especially if you use a ‘free’ email system such as hotmail or Gmail, Facebook can search your email addresses and see if anyone in your address book is already on Facebook.

5. Profile information – school, university, company

The first piece of profile information Facebook asks for is your School (leaving year), University (leaving year) and Company – this starts the first basic groups links so you can find Alumni and colleagues from work – if you don’t want to find anyone there, leave it empty and click skip.

6. Profile information – picture

Your photo or avatar doesn’t need to be of you, but it’s usually a good idea to use a shot of yourself so that people that aren’t sure they’ve found you can add you. Many people change their profile photos weekly though, so you can use just about any image you hold copyright to.

7. Profile information – basic information

Once you’ve gotten into Facebook, you can fill in any or all personal information on the basic information box, and depending on your security settings, people will be able to see this – it’s sometimes the difference between knowing whether it’s you or another person that they’ll friend, so this information can be useful.

8. Profile information – is Facebook a dating site?

One of the core pieces of information that Facebook asks about on signup is what you’re ‘looking’ for on the site, along with your religious standing. Don’t be afraid to mark ‘friendship’ in that box, even if you are actively seeking a relationship – it makes little difference to people adding you. Facebook is not a dating site, though there are groups on there for finding partners.

9. Profile information – personal information

Many people don’t list all of their hobbies- instead list the ones you’re interested in attracting friends for. If you’ve got a ‘guilty pleasure’ remember that people may be able to access your information, even before you add them, so you may not want to publish that. The boxes in this section are entirely optional.

10.Contact information

One of the boxes you can fill in is ‘contact information’. Be aware that depending on your security settings (see security and privacy) you may then place your ID out in the ‘open’ which can open you up to spam or bot contact.

11. Profile information – network

If you’re interested in chatting with, or meeting up with people in your region, you can add where you life and join that ‘uber-group’. Some require email addresses or other information that ‘proves’ affiliation, but Facebook has recently improved that interface, so it works very well. Your network affiliation is listed on your profile, unless you change the security settings (see security and privacy)

12.Profile information – friends

As we’ll explain later, you can keep those that you’ve added from appearing in your search, but your friends list is always visible. Be careful when adding ‘controversial’ people in your life, as it’s very easy for other friends to use your list to find others to add – the only exception to this is if you add someone with extremely tight security settings

13. Profile information – relationships

Facebook allows the listing of relationships in your profile – but until the person you’re in a relationship confirms it; you will only be listed as in a relationship. Otherwise you will be tagged as ‘in a relationship’ but not with whom.

14. Fill as much of it in as possible

Remember, you can always come back and add, or subtract information. It’s usually something people don’t do often though, so spending those extra few minutes at sign up to create a proper profile is well worth it.

15. Security from the outset

We talk more about security later, but some people join Facebook simply to keep up with a tiny group of friends – if you’re one of these people, then you will want to ensure your security is as tight as can be (see security and privacy)

16. Finding friends, colleagues and 'fan' pages

Facebook has made it fairly easy to find people and add them, but in the mix with the people you can find are fan pages – which are like mini profiles (we talk about these more in section) and groups. It’s important to remember that people, such as authors or local personalities may have multiple listings in search results, so you may need to contact them and ask which to add. You also have to take one extra step to make sure people can find you. You can currently have 5,000 friends total.

17. Searches

Searching by name may bring back dozens of results, so if you know the person well enough, find out what email they use and add them via that. Adding people via email is often easier than searches too because it means you’re certain you’ve got the right person, without opening yourself up to unwanted attention. If you add someone that isn’t actually the person you wanted to add, they can see your profile.

18. Adding people via friends

If you’re a close knit group of friends, or a new group that met through University or similar pursuit, it’s normally ok to go through another friend’s list and find those that you know, but don’t abuse this – adding everyone from every friend’s list can get you flagged as a spammer by
Facebook.

19. More than one profile?

Be careful not to create more than one Facebook page – it’s against their TOS and can lead to confusion when people add you. It is possible to create a main account and make the rest of your ‘accounts’ as pages, but again be careful – Facebook has a policy about fake pages, fake names or abusing that facility.

20. Fan pages too much for you?

You can hide fan page (and app, and even ‘friend’ updates) from view easily by setting your feed up (we talk more about this in the feed management section). Hiding fan pages, even temporarily, can let you get your Facebook reading back under control, and let you decide whether you want to follow them long term.

21. Removing friends, or pages

Removing friends is easy – you just go into your friends list and click the x beside their name. You can find your friend list by looking at the left column of your main feed based Facebook page. Or you can go to ‘Account’ and then ‘edit Friends’

You can remove pages in a similar way, in ‘Edit friends’ then scrolling down to around the middle of the page and clicking on ‘pages’ (it has an orange flag next to it).

22. Using friends lists to organize your reading

Facebook introduced a concept called ‘friends lists’ recently, allowing people to sort their friends into groups, sorting them onto groups of your choosing. Have workmates, best friends, limited profile – the choice is yours. You can also edit en masse by selecting ‘Account’ then ‘edit friends’ – your whole list will appear there with drop down arrow lists, including your pages. Simply filter them onto a list you’re comfortable with and then you can control your feed.

Posting using groups – Your friends list doesn’t just allow you to filter your reading - these groups can simply control what you’re reading or allow you to customize who sees what. If you don’t want your Granny seeing your wild nights out, simply filter her into a group and then, when you post, click on the little light blue padlock. Enter your level of access, and exclude using the bottom box. You can set this as your ‘custom’ privacy build for your posts, or a one off. (see more in security and privacy)

23. Been Blocked?

Facebook is hard to contact in case of problems, but you can sometimes email them at whatever published email contact they currently have, and ask them to review your case – if you’ve done nothing wrong you should be reinstated. If you were hacked, you should contact support urgently and follow their instructions to regain control and become unblocked.

24. Got badge?

One of Facebook’s nicest widgets is the ability to create badges and display them on your webpage or site. If you’ve got a reasonably public profile, you can use these easily – if your profile is highly protected and privacy locked, you may want to consider whether you want to use it at all.

25. Looking for more?

If you have just recently joined Facebook, instead of searching for everyone by name, go to another friend’s profile and find the people you’re looking for by checking their ‘friends’ box, on the left hand side, below information. Be careful not to add too many people though – it can be seen as spamming and may be picked up by Facebook.

26. Security and privacy

There’s a lot of options in Facebook that you have to pay attention to, especially if you don’t want to put your information in public. There are options to protect everything that you have on Facebook, creating a stripped out, bare public profile, but you DO need to change your settings, it’s not automatic on creation.

27. Use fine grained controls

Don’t want your family accessing your photos – lock them out. Want to only allow reading access to your status updates to people closest to you? You can do that too (though remember, apps use your default posting, which is your overall status posting setting). Go to ‘Account’ then ‘privacy settings and explore your options there.

28.The tightest locks

If you put everything in your security to ‘friends’ and remove yourself from search engine results, and then start using Facebook, you’ll have to add people, and they’ll never be able to do it themselves. If you don’t want people knowing you’re on Facebook, this is an ideal solution

29. Know your settings!

Understanding what the different settings mean for privacy and posting is what makes or breaks your Facebook usage. There are four settings – ‘Everyone’, ‘Friends of friends’, friends only and custom. Friends of friends means that any information you share on your profile can be visible by anyone that has friend any of your friends, opening your profile up to a lot more exposure.

30. Your name, date of birth, address and other information

Keeping as much of your information private as you can means that you can protect yourself against identity fraud – this also means not adding random people and practicing safe login and logout practices. Facebook is rife with mistakes that have opened people up to identity fraud, but knowing your way around security settings will stop this.

For continuation from 31 to 101, go to http://www.facebook.com/101FBTips

One of the Best Tool For Social Networking!

Hoo's Using HootSuite?

For quite a long time, I've been using Ping.fm to automatically sends-out messages in various accounts like FaceBook, Twitter and LinkedIn. I've fallen in love with this tool but I'm searching for this feature. I want a tool that schedule my messages.

In Blogger.com like this blog in that platform. I sometimes schedule my blog posts so that I can save some time. As the saying "Time is Gold" schedule my blog posts will not make me to be in-front of my computer so I just can make a daily blog posts. Well, I don't have to 'cause though I'm a blogger I don't to be a slave of my computer monitor.

In search of an scheduling tool that can spread my message in social networking sites, I find this. The tools is called HootSuite and there's plenty of features in HootSuite aside from scheduling messages.

Why Choose HootSuite:
1. More people and company trust HootSuite. Look below, I bet your familiar to at least one.

2. My favorite feat, scheduling message on FaceBook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Ping.fm, WordPress, MySpace, Foursquare and mixi. You don't need to have an account on each of those social networking sites.I don't have a mixi account, it's a Japanese social networking site and don't know Japanese.LOL.

3. Do you read number 2. Well, you'll can also track your messages in each of these networking sites. You can see even the message that you suppose to send(scheduled).

4. Registration will only take you a minute. What's better based on my experience is once you finish to fill-up the sign-up form and click "Create Account", you can immediately start using HootSuite. No more email confirmation.

5. It's free. Yes, just some tool, there's always a free version and some upgraded version. You can connect up to 5 networking sites. If you want to have unlimited sites, then pay $5.99 a month though there's a 30-day free trail.

How To Make An Upside Down Status Updates on Face Book?

This is obviously posted for coolness reason. Do you want to learn some tricks in FaceBook and almost anything about this world's most populated social networking site. I found this in this website.

reface.me

If you want to impress your friends with some tricks you know in FaceBook then go to that site.

Here's one example. Do you know how to make an upside message in you status updates especially in FaceBook.

To learn about this trick just click here. There you'll find a text generator that will automatically turn anything you type in 180 degree rotation.

Friendster Will Delete Your Data On May 31, 2011

 I had different email account for my Friendster account. 'Cause Friendster is almost non-existent in these days where FaceBook dominated all the social networking sites in the world, I don't want to be bothered anymore by email notifications that came from Friendster.

But I can still remember when Social Networking is young in the Philippines, I will spend hours editing my profile to make more personalized. Tons and tons of html edits had been done, I'll go to some profile to get some cool ideas. There was Friendster profile customization craze in the Philippines during those days as far as I know.

Then here comes the FaceBook. Basically, unlike the Friendster, FaceBoook was strict in terms of designing your own profile. The theme is blue-black-white and nothing more. Probably that would be one of the reasons why FaceBook became so popular. The neatness and simplicity adds more power to FaceBook.

Last week, I read from my friend in FaceBook's status update that Friendster will be vanish from thin air.Then, I remember all my memorable pictures there especially my college graduation pictures. So for a very long time, again I open my email account for Friendster and found-out this message.

 

The message tells me that the Friendster is introducing a new and improved site so I have to export all my profile data  on or before May 31, 2011. 

So I try to export all my data. After a while(I think hours depending on how large your data is) I received again an email with download link of your profile data.

I don't know all the answers about this but I got this news that FaceBook acquires Friendster patents for tantamount $40 million. 

My List of FIRST

Image Source: http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3319/3417340248_0f4bdb2a9c.jpg

This year was for one the most memorable in a sense that I experience so many things for the first time or at least the first since a very long time.

Just want to share to you my joy in those experiences so this will not be a long writing(or typing, lol).

I met my uncles, aunties and some of my relatives in my father's side for the first time ever last April. They're from Italy and told that story from one of my blog posts.

I met my high school classmates some of them for the first time in seven years. Here were some of our pictures in my FaceBook account. Yap, you need to log-in first. I doubt you have a FaceBook account 'cause it's only known to few people like me. Having 400 million users the time I'm doing this blog post. :)

I also enjoyed the first rain for the month of May. Here's some of the crazy pictures with my cousin and sisters. With this scorching summer temperature, we can't help but to enjoy those I consider a rare phenomena during this burning days of my life. Sorry for being so dramatic. I know you can relate too.

The first time we had a get together with my friends from my reviewing days in my board exam. The first time since the time after the board exam. Some of us passed the exam while some unfortunately don't. But what the heck, it's the friendship that I gained that I cherished the most. They're the ones I count on when I needed help with regards with my studies and with them I learned to do house chores. There I learned to wash my clothes for the first time. I don't  came from a wealthy family but you know  at home the love of a mother, some of them just want you to study hard and they'll do the things that you don't want to do like washing and ironing your clothes. But when you're away, most of the time you're on your own and that experience force me to discipline myself.

Just a week ago, I had a get-together with some of friends and  co-worker at the beach. I enjoyed the trip and the camaraderie among us. I really don't like singing in a video-oke(a machine especially created for frustrated singers) so with only four of us among the I think twenty of us, we sung from midnight until we noticed that the sun was rising. We also rode a boat, I can't remember when the last time I rode one so that's maybe also a first time.

I also attended seminars from Jomar Hilario about internet marketing so I met people there also for the first time.

I never knew that it is fun to meet different people. When I look at my personality as being a timid and reserved person, I really don't like to be in a situation with people that were really a complete strangers to me. Still, it is hard for me to approach some people but not that quite hard compared when I was in college. This does not mean that I loved to be a people-pleaser, that would a stressful thing to do. One of the key to failure is to try to please everybody.

Last Thursday, I got my TIN number for the first time. I've been waiting for two months for my company to give me that number. I need that so I can get a credit card or at least a debit card to connect to my PayPal account. So nine months later, 3 credit card application denied had passed. I don't know if it's because I don't have a TIN number or it's just a reflection of how low my salary is that even bank who issued credit cards don't believed that I'm capable to have one. Thanked God I decided to go BIR (Bureau of Internal Revenue) office in spite of  the intense summer heat. I don't get my TIN number from my company although they're the one whose supposed to give me but I got it by sending myself to the BIR office in San Pablo, my place. My long wait of two months and still waiting just took me for about five minutes. By the way, TIN number is Taxpayer Identification Number, we're all taxpayers so no need for further explanation, I suppose.

I said that would not be a long writing. So that's it. Hope you also enjoy the people in your life.

A Greater Reason

It's been a bit long since I posted in this personal blog of mine, a blog about my how I will grow in order to become richer and to fulfill my dreams. As of now, I can say that I'm already rich, I have great friends at work, friends from high school although I'm connected to most of them through text messaging and through facebook chat and status. Also with some of my college friends that also pursuing their chosen careers, where some were my co-workers.

"Co-worker" might sound like working in a construction site building a skyscraper doing physically tiring stuffs (you know what I mean). I can't just think of another word for co-worker, I can't call them office-mates because where not really in office supervising people but rather we're the one whose really in the field. If we were in a war, we're the privates, the front-liners who really has a big chance to be shot and killed. At work, we are the ones that literary in Filipino "nag-aalay  ng dugo at pawis" (sacrificing sweat and blood). Maybe I'm just exaggerating but I just want to emphasize that my work is really tiring as in you have to sweat and sometimes blood spills if there were some accidents, and I thank God that never happens to me.

Last Christmas, we were scheduled to worked from December 24 'til 29. When the Christmas day has come when everyone was with their families celebrating the most important day of the year, I was working doing what I've been doing for over a year. I'm in a graveyard shift, so I came to my Lola's house (Lola means grandmother) to celebrate Christmas there in the morning. I almost forgot how tired I am when I saw her, I think that is what is Christmas is all about, to make love with your relatives and friends to fill-up your weariness. Christmas is the time where I realized how big my family were, from aunties, uncles, cousins, cousins of my mother, brothers and sisters of my grandmother, and so on. At least they don't come in full blast cause I don't how could we all fit in Lola's house although it's fairly big but not big enough. LOL.

I experienced  this is from 8:00 in the morning, the time I arrived at Lola's house 'til 10:30 as I can remember. Why? Because like I said I almost forgot I was tired but just almost, the moment that I lie on bed, a soft and comfty bed, I'm just like a light turned-off, in a snap I was asleep. I just find myself awake I think it was three in the afternoon, I don't know but I still managed to wake-up at that time no matter what time I sleep or at most 10:30am. Maybe that was because of habit.

Then I ate obviously, anyway it's Christmas day and I have to fill-up my emptiness. I was a very skinny boy and many can't believe how large my appetite was, I can't believe it either. This might be some of  my greatest mysteries in life. Then some chit-chat with my relatives while eating. After that, I take a bath and make myself ready for another day of routine work in this very day of Christmas. But before that I sung in a video-oke, a machine where you can choose a song and sing whether the song like you or not. And I like the song, period. LOL.

Because of that frustration to sing, I've waited because there's a list of songs from my fellow frustrated singers before mine. That was also the reason I was left behind by the shuttle bus service. I just smiled and told myself  "'yan pakanta-kanta pa kasi"(tsk, I'm was left because of my frustration in singing).

That Christmas day was a very long day for me, there were so many things that happens during that day. It was a simple yet colorful day to me. Because of my work, I learned now how those parents feel when they are away with their children. My experience was nothing compared to the emotions they brought to longing for their love ones.

With that experienced I find a greater reason why I should persevere to achieve my dreams. My dreams to have enough time and money to share to other people. I have so many things that I want to share with this blog post but it's enough for now.

I just want you to know that the best lessons in life is from life experiences.

One more reason why I can't share more to this blog post is that I have to go school, not to study but to teach, I'm also a school teacher. That's another story, but for now, I really have to go.


Ooops, Happy New Year!!! ^^