My Small Business Consultants

Today is Micrsoft’s Patch Tuesday.  If you have automatic updates turned on you should see updates appear sometime today.

Microsoft also announced an update later this month to its Windows Update Service.  If you remember last year they just updated this service without informing the public and there was a huge outcry from the tech community.  InfoWorld has a nice article on the update located here: http://www.infoworld.com/article/08/07/08/Microsoft_warns_users_of_coming_update_to_Windows_Update_1.html?source=rss&url=http://www.infoworld.com/article/08/07/08/Microsoft_warns_users_of_coming_update_to_Windows_Update_1.html

Please take a few moments and update your computers, by tomorrow the bad guys will know where the problems are and there will be an exploit waiting to take over your computer.

If you need a little help with the updates, or you are concerned that you might be infected, please email me at Dean@mysmbc.com and schedule an appointment.

I have been invited to do a little blogging for a friend and fellow podcaster.  I will be writing short product reviews and comentary on gadgets on the Totally Cool Tech Podcast site.  I will also cross post the stories here.  My first story has been submitted and when its posted on that site I will also post it here. 

 If you have any questions or comments, I would love to hear them.

With the launch of the Kindle from Amazon.com today, I have been pondering the idea of eBook Readers. 

I believe that most eBook reviewers have completely missed the mark.  Yes it’s great to have your entire reading library in one device, but its not for your average novel.

I am thinking about getting an eBook reader, not because I read alot of books.  (the fact is I do not read a lot)  I want a way to take with me all the technology reference manuals, help books, training guides, and other reference material when I visit a customer’s site.  Imagine, You have the entire Microsoft Reference Library, Cisco training materials, Product Manuals, and many other collections at your fingertips.  No more taking up shelf space. No more going back to the office to find your reference material.

Now take this one step further.  A company could put out their manuals and guides in eBook form.  When and update happens, just push out the update like any other computer update and the eBook instantly loads the new material.  Entire volumes of data at your fingertips. 

I can easily see this used in manufacturing, insurance, legal, and many other professions.I believe the company that begins making this available, will push the eBook market into something worth purchasing.If you have an opinion, comment or question, please leave a comment or email me at: deanjensen@mysmbc.com  

I spent about 4 hours of Friday waiting to drop off some of my electronic junk at an event here in Minnesota.  An event held locally by Materials Processing Corporation of Eagan held an event at the Mall of America offering free recycling of used electronics. 

I loaded up my truck with a number of items that I wanted to recycle, headed down to the Mall of America to wait in line to have my stuff recycled.  From the news reports of the previous day, I knew it would be a little while, I waited for over an hour and a half.  I was not anywhere near the event.  It looked like I was going to have to wait for a few hours, but that was ok with me.  I got in line at 9:45 AM.  The event was canceled and closed at 11:30.  All people in line were sent home.  The event was to run for three days and it ended early on the second day.

Here is one news story on the event from Fox 9 News

On the one hand, I think it was a great service that the above company provided, but on the other hand, their poor planning wasted a large number of peoples time, gas, energy and willingness to do good.

Should the company be held responsible to those people that made the effort?  I know I will think twice about recommending the company to my clients. 

If you know of any good recycling comanies that offer low cost or free electronics recycling, I would be very interested to hear about them.  I need someone new for my recommendations and my personal equipment.

This is a quick post to inform you that our web site suffered a crash and we had to move to a new hosting provider.  I will be adding information here soon.  Please stop back.