Facebook is Making us Dumb and Twitter is Making us Dumber

“Amazon is destroying the American book industry.”

Facebook is making us dumb and Twitter is making us dumber.

Here’s how…

“Who knows what percentage of their time would have been spent reading books,” we ask the cosmos, “if they weren’t fooling around with Facebook all the time?”

They, of course, are Gen Xs, Ys and Zs… but they are baby boomers, too. We’re obsessed, all of us, with reading short bits of text. There are tweens [kids ages 10 to 12] out there today who think of themselves as people who read a lot… when what they read a lot of, are status updates and BuzzFeed lists.

It’s too late for bookstores to turn around into a profitable business again, whether it’s got thousands of Facebook friends or not. From where we stand, there’s only so much one small bookstore owner, with the help of a small handful of staffers and volunteers, can do to turn the tides of a culture that doesn’t even seem to want to sit down and read books the way it used to. With so many digital options like Kindles, tablets, blogs-memes, reality TV, Tumblrs, Facebook, and Tweets… the simple act of reading a book that you hold in your hands is seriously endangered.

All of these technological advances that seem so commonplace have barely been in our lives for a decade now. And we’ve all had the uneasy feeling on occasion, reading what our loved ones have to say on Facebook, that the nature of social-media conversation is making us dumber by the minute. I don’t think it’s even open for debate: “You cannot develop an argument in a Facebook post… it’s just impossible. And if people don’t exercise that faculty of having a proposition and presenting evidence, if people aren’t used to thinking that way, or seeing it done in books… there’s a serious intellectual decline in front of us.”

So often, we see shoppers stroll through a bookstore like Barns & Noble looking for a specific author and a title, ask if the store has it in stock… and if it’s not there, they’re not interested in having the store order it for them. Not when they can walk right back-out and order it on Amazon. It’s a scenario I see play out several times a week. It’s not that bookstores can’t get them the book in a few days, and it’s not that Barns & Nobel doesn’t have an easy-to-remember web store of its own. It’s simply that, with Amazon so ubiquitous, would-be customers don’t bat an eye at the idea that they can get whatever they want, as cheap as they want, without having to give up any convenience at all.

“Oh, I’ll go on-line”, they say… but we know they’re going to Amazon and not to Barns & Noble website. They won’t take the time to compare.  Amazon isn’t just Barns and Noble’s nemesis… it’s ruining all kinds of people with all the little bookstores. They undersell everybody, basically losing money until there’s no competition.

Amazon just posted a healthy $17.09 billion in net sales during its third quarter, a 24 percent jump compared with the same period a year ago. But the company lost 9¢ per share. This is what amounts for good news to Amazon shareholders: Analysts had predicted sales of $16.77 billion and accurately predicted that 9¢ loss.

That’s a shame. Because brick-and-mortar bookstores meet other needs, beyond simply selling books, that customers won’t be able to get once Amazon is their only remaining choice.

What’s painful for any indie bookstore owner to admit, of course, is that Amazon can pretty much always give the book buyer a better deal. “There’s no question about it,” store owners will tell you. “If you come into our bookstore looking at a book that’s $25, but Amazon’s selling it for $20 for new or $10 for used.”

“There are people, who are willing and eager to pay the extra few dollars for personal service from a proprietor they know-but they’re just too few and far between.”

Here’s my take on this problem…

Little problem: “Amazon is destroying the American book industry.”

Big Problem: “Facebook is making us dumb and Twitter is making us dumber.”

Cheers and We’ll see you soon.

Anant Goel

Producer CEO – RKNet Studios

www.D2GO2.com

www.CognitionsBridge.com

How to Create and Save Passwords in a Safe and Secure Password Vault

Passwords are literally the keys to your online world.

In spite of advances in biometrics, and increased attention to the value of two-step authentication, passwords remain the primary means of digital security. They’re also one of the weakest links in the security chain. If we can’t get rid of passwords, we need a better way to manage them.

Remember when Bill Gates told an audience, “There is no doubts that over time, people are going to rely less and less on passwords.” That was in early 2004 and nearly a decade later we still rely heavily on passwords.

It’s tough to keep track of all of your passwords.  People use the same password on different systems and write them down to make a list.  That just doesn’t really meet the challenge for anything you really want to secure.

For many years, I recycled the same password across virtually every account as well.  However, the Websites that I use forced me to change the habit… because their password policies are so different from one to the next that it became very difficult to even find a password that meets all the requirements.

In a perfect world, we would store complex passwords in our brains for all the Websites we use.

But, we are human and definitely not perfect.  That’s why I’ve been looking for a good way to store the growing list of increasingly complex passwords.

In my quest, I consulted a few security experts and turned to Google search for helpful suggestions.  My research turned up several options for each of the three-levels of sophistication:

LEVEL 1: Low-tech

Write it down and make a list. It’s actually not all that bad a strategy at home, if there aren’t too many people poking around there and you tuck it away somewhere you can remember. But this is a bad idea at the office, where any number of people could see your list. Some people keep their passwords on a card in their wallet, which might work well, at least, until the day your wallet is lost or stolen.

LEVEL 2: Medium-tech

When you’re at a Website, and your memory fails, use the website features for resetting your password.  You can do this endlessly and it’s free, and it has the side benefit of causing you to change your passwords often, which is highly recommended by security experts.

LEVEL 3: High-tech

You can use one of the many digital tools available for storing and using encrypted login information. These premium paid services they will allow you to use mind-bending passwords on every site… while only having to remember one master password (or use a fingerprint or other biometric).  Many of these tools also generate hyper-strong passwords for you with a click, so you no longer have to bend your mind trying to come up with them.

These premium paid services are not cheap and could be overkill for an average professional or working soccer mom.

D2GO2 Password Vault

D2GO2 Password Vault is simply a secure place to create and save your passwords when you need them… from anywhere, anytime, and on any device.  It is easy to use; and passwords are saved under your D2GO2 Profile page and secured by two- step authentication and SSL Certified encrypted.

One last piece of advice…

Best practice security suggests that you should create a strong password and use different passwords for different sites. Just as you don’t use the same key for your front door, car, and safety deposit box.

You don’t want to have the same password “unlock” all of your information.

Cheers and We’ll see you soon.

D2GO2

Anant Goel

Producer CEO – RKNet Studios

http://www.D2GO2.com

 

How Marketers Fool Consumers Everyday

Neuroscientists will tell you, and I’m one of them, that more has been learned about the human brain in the past decade than in all of human history combined.

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It should not come as a surprise to see all the new information published about the brain and how it is converging with the efforts of marketers to more effectively communicate with consumers.  Putting it bluntly, with so much more knowledge about the brain, marketers have been busy figuring out ways to fool the consumer into buying products and services they may or may not need.

Ponder this fact for a moment: the human brain hasn’t changed for more than 100,000 years. Yet its exposure to information — especially image and video-based communication — is growing at an unprecedented rate.  Research is actually able to quantify how all this multi-platform messaging is affecting subconscious responses in the brain.  One of their observations is the effect on “filtering.”

It is the process of filtering, where the prefrontal cortex of the brain continuously coordinates and prioritizes incoming stimuli and information, deciding what is essential and what can be ignored or “filed away” for later.  More stimuli and information requires more filtering.

Our multi-processing instincts in the multi-device world have caused the brain to kick into overdrive, making prioritization more important than ever.

Marketers have been busy burning the mid-night oil, as the grand Ma saying goes, to get through this “filtering” of the consumer(s) brain that screens megabytes of data every millisecond?

Well, the marketers have finally figured out how to use the neurological best practices on you; to quickly grab the attention of online audiences’ collective subconscious. And it’s all legal.

This is how it’s done in five easy ways…

1)     Use of Action Words

The brain’s filtering process seems to afford greater significance to action-oriented words. Passive words are ignorable, but action words convey emotion and appeal to the reader’s senses. Marketers use words like discover, explore, download, find and compare more than the milder words like submit or read. But don’t limit yourself to just verbs; words like free and easy, can also be very powerful attention-grabbers.

2)     Stimulate with Puzzles

The brain is attracted to solving visual puzzles. There is actually a feedback mechanism in the brain that rewards the acquisition of knowledge, which essentially makes us humans addicted to gaining new knowledge.  It’s that little burst of excitement you get by quickly solving a brain teaser. Marketers will use simple puzzles into their online messaging as a way to quickly grab your attention.

3)     Recognize Gender Differences

The brains of men and women are 99% the same, but that last 1% is critical for marketers.

The frontal lobe, which is responsible for problem solving, is bigger in women than in men. When marketing to women, they leverage this insight by posing a question in their advertising message — something that will interest the female audience through mystery, intrigue or fascination.  Even questions with a yes/no answer can capture the attention of a female audience… but it is quickly followed up with an answer that compels them to read further, such as “Find out why” or “Get the facts.”

The amygdala, which regulates the “fight or flight” response, is larger in men than in women. Emotions make men pay attention right now− this is urgent− and gives them an immediate action plan without having to think twice. When marketing to men, they would use urgency and be direct.  Statements like: “This deal ends Friday at midnight,” gets male attention better and motivates a response.

4)     Simplify The Message

When it comes to online marketing, and especially social media marketing, more is definitely not better. Marketing messages are made simple so that they are easy for the brain to receive and ignore.  If it is way too complicated (or uninteresting) most people will not stop to see, listen or read.

5)      Attract with Novelty

The brain is hardwired to appreciate and seek out novelty.  In fact, there’s an entire region of the mid-brain that responds to novel stimuli. Novelty influences interest, surprise, attraction and even motivation.  Marketers will disguise their messaging with unexpected colors, unusual words or unique images to draw attention.  However, marketers are advised to use this tool wisely, as the brain also seeks familiarity.

One final advice to marketers…

If you use a wacky photo in Facebook ad to grab attention, be consistent with what customers might expect from your brand — or what they see on rest of the page —  because, attention may quickly turn to confusion; complicating your messaging and turning visitors away.

All the new research coming out of neuroscience, coupled with the rapidly evolving ways people are consuming information, is giving marketers a lot of tools to fool us in to buying products and services we may not need.

You’ve been warned… be aware.

The human brain may not have changed much in 100,000 years, but the world we live-in has. Big corporations, big marketing budgets, big Pharma, big governments have changed our lives dramatically over the last 40 years.

We are now diabetic, obese, sicker, stressed out and fearful of everything in life, click button junkie, and going broke enjoying sedentary life style.

Cheers and we’ll see you soon.

Anant Goel

Producer CEO – RKNet Studios

https://www.d2go2.com/

How to Control Paper Clutter by Managing Your Mail

Mail is the largest source of paper clutter in your home and the most time consuming to sort.

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Managing mail is a daunting task because you can’t just visually organize mail, you’ve got to read and touch every paper in order to file or discard.

Try these five steps…

STEP 1:

Designate Something as Your Home Mail Box

It can be a basket or a storage box… anything big enough to hold a week’s mail and no more. Locate it in a place that’s convenient, but not so out of the way that it’s out of sight and mind.

STEP 2:

Reduce the Amount of Mail that Comes into Your Home

Over 80% of the mail you receive daily is junk mail… as more and more companies still try to reach us by snail mail in the age of Internet, smartphones, emails, and banner ads everywhere.

Try these tips to stop junk mail:

• Always Uncheck the Mailing List Box: Next time you sign up for something; make sure you specify what you’re signing up to receive. Uncheck any boxes for subscriptions you do not want to receive.
• Don’t Enter Yourself into Contests: Signing up for a contest says to the company: “I want to hear from you in the future.”
• Call 1-888-5 OPT OUT and have your name removed from the credit agencies’ lists.
• Call Catalog Companies: Set aside some time each month to call and ask them to take you off their mailing list.
• Cancel Subscriptions: to magazines you don’t need. Donate old magazines to charitable organizations or your local library or hospital.

Cutting down on junk mail you receive will cut the amount of time you spend managing mail… and you may even help save the planet.

STEP 3:

Schedule Time to Organize and Manage Mail

Most people sort through mail while walking in the door after work or heading to the kitchen to see what’s for dinner. Resist the urge to manage mail until you have the time and attention to give to this task.

Never touch a piece of paper more than once if you don’t have too. This is what makes paper management so exhausting… if you have to read it each time!

STEP 4:

Have the Right Tools and a System for Incoming Mail

Nothing fancy, but have the following at hand:

• Shredder – Shred all pieces of mail that have any identifying information on it beyond your name… such as social security numbers, birth date, and credit card offers. Shred immediately and recycle.
• Recycling Bin− Most mail can be recycled immediately (catalogs, coupons, fliers, announcements). Treat your wastebasket like babies: Keep them close at all times and feed and change them often.
• Action In-Box: This is the mail you need to act on right away… and it can be separated into further categories like Reference, Respond, Action, and Pay Bills.

STEP 5:

Organize and Act on What’s Important in Life

Sort through your Action In-Box on a regular basis and purge its contents to the system you create. Allot a few minutes each day or an hour once a week, whatever works for you… just make it a habit.

• Organize Magazines and Catalogs: Separate these bulky items from your mail right away. Put them in a designated basket or magazine rack so you can carry them easily from room to room for your reading pleasure… and then to the recycling bin when you’re done.
• File Reference Items: Create a folder or a binder to save recipes, magazine articles, and catalog pages with perfect gifts or your wish-list items. Just be sure to get the 800 number or website address.
• File Records and Documents: A file cabinet is ideal, but a cardboard file box will do, as long as there’s a workable file structure inside it. Organize files by broad subjects… and if your life’s less complicated, filing everything alphabetically may do nicely. Write up labels and alphabetize for quick retrieval. Use D2GO2 App to manage your Records and have easy access from anywhere, anytime, and on any device.
• Streamline Bill-Paying: Many banks let you set up bill-paying plans and receive statements online. Some utilities and service companies offer online and automated-payment options that either deduct money straight from your checking account or automatically charge your balance to a chosen credit card every month. Make sure to review your statements to keep your checkbook balanced, but you’ll be free of the physical check writing and stamp licking, as well as those late fees. Use D2GO2 App to manage your Budget and Pay Bills from anywhere, anytime, and on any device.

Managing mail is a daunting task… but it doesn’t have to be. Never touch a piece of paper more than once if you don’t have to… and that’s the secret of organized and successful people.

Cheers and we’ll see you soon.

Anant Goel

Producer CEO – RKNet Studios

https://www.d2go2.com/home/d2go2home