Eight Ways To Go Viral
by Contributor

Editor’s note: This guest post is written by Uzi Shmilovici, CEO and founder of Future Simple, the company behind Base—a simple CRM for small businesses

What do Facebook, LinkedIn, Youtube, Dropbox and Skype have in common? Except for being ridiculously successful, they all enjoyed a strong viral effect that helped accelerate their growth.

How did they do that? Here’s the thing; most people assume that these companies grew by pure word of mouth. Well, that’s only half of the story. The other half is that they deliberately built viral features into their products that helped spread the word.

Let me explain.

The Eight Types of Virality

Many entrepreneurs struggle with the question: “How can I make my product more viral?” After looking at many successful web startups, I boiled down virality to eight different tactics, or types, that are the most common. Grab a pen:

1.    Inherent virality

The type of virality you’ll die for. Simply put, a person gets no value from the

product unless other people use it as well. As a result, she shares the product with other people. Sharing is done via sharing mechanisms (e.g: invite your Gmail contacts) or through pure word of mouth.

Seeding, which means getting the first people on board is very hard because of Metcalf’s Law (there’s very low value for the first users of the product). However, the growth after the seeding period, usually through word of mouth, can be explosive. This is how Skype came to be what it is.

2.    Collaboration virality

In this type of virality, a person will benefit from using the product individually. However, she can get additional value from collaborating with other people, so she invites them to use the product. A classic example is folder sharing on Dropbox. This works very well if the value from collaborating is high.

3.    Communication virality

In this case the product is used to communicate with other people, some of which might be potential users. By “riding” this communication channel (usually email), the product is being spread. If you ever got an email sent with Constant Contact, you probably remember seeing their logo at the bottom. A more pervasive example is the “Sent from my iPhone/iPad” signature at the bottom of every email you send from your iPhone or iPad. Yes, even Apple is using viral tactics (actually, I believe BlackBerry started that with “Sent using BlackBerry”).

4.    Incentivized virality

Offering an incentive to spread the word is a well-known tactic dating back to offline marketing. The incentive will usually be cash or a benefit in return of inviting other people to use the product. For instance, Gilt Group will give you a $25 credit for each person you refer. Dropbox will give extra space to both you and your invitee’s Dropbox accounts, which turned out to work very well. Personally, I’m not a big fan of the cash incentive approach as it is not very scalable but if you can make it work economically, it might be very effective.

5.    Embeddable virality

This method works superbly well for content websites. The ability to take a piece of content and embed it anywhere on the web, with a link back to the original website. This will put your product in front of countless users. There’s an interesting multiplier that occurs when new people who are exposed to the content embed it on their own website, promoting it even further. This approach has worked tremendously well for Youtube and Slideshare.

6.    Signature virality

Users that are using your product, either embed one of the features in their own website or refer people to a hosted page to use a specific feature. In both cases, when this feature is displayed to other people, it also includes a “powered by” signature at the bottom, which then becomes a lead generation machine. Survey products are well known for the “hosted survey” approach (SurveyMonkey probably started it). This has also worked well for helpdesk companies such as Uservoice.

7.    Social virality

In this case, companies leverage existing social networks to spread the word about their product. Typically, you sign up for the product with a social network id (say your Facebook id) and then through using the product, you broadcast to your social graph the fact that you are using it.  Zynga exploded on Facebook because every time you fed your goat, all your friends knew about it. Spotify’s killer integration with Facebook is another great example of that. There’s much more depth to explore on the specific mechanics of using this tactic, but if you get it right, you’ll experience tremendous growth.

You can also add Twitter and Facebook accounts on top of an existing signup and broadcast to both whenever the user performs an action. Instagram does exactly that to get more exposure for the app and it seems to work well for them.

Also, I have no idea what are the results of the CutCopy album page but I found their use of this tactic to be super interesting.

8.    Pure word of mouth virality

Pure word of mouth happens when people are spreading the word about the product just because they enjoyed it, it’s free, or they think it’s cool. While this is very hard to quantify, there are two things you can do to support that kind of virality. First, build an awesome product that people really love (Evernote). Second, make it special and give people something to talk about. That’s where branding comes into play. I don’t have their numbers but I can guess that a significant part of Mailchimp’s growth is from people talking about their funny quirkiness.

Measuring Virality

If you are like me, then you cannot imagine doing anything without measuring it, or as Mark Pincus says: “You might as well not change it at all if you’re not going to measure the impact of that change.”

Measuring virality is very interesting. Many people are focused on the “Virality Coefficient” – how many new users on average does one user of your product “infect.” The holy grail is to reach a virality coefficient greater than 1. This usually results in exponential growth.

The virality coefficient is super important, but there’s one other critical number that you should pay attention to—the cycle time. The cycle time is the average time it takes from the moment that one of your users performs a viral action to the moment that a new user signs up because of this very action. It makes a huge difference if your cycle time is one day or 60 days.

David Skok of Matrix Ventures gave a presentation about that recently, and actually devised a formula to calculate the amount of users you will get after a period of time based on the Virality Coefficient (K) and the Cycle Time (ct).

Having virality expressed in this way is beneficial as it boils down virality to the optimization of two variables: maximize K and minimize ct.

It’s really quite simple. Pass it on.

But What If You’re Un-Googleable?
by Alexia Tsotsis

Investor and serial entrepreneur Chris Dixon has written a notable (and mercifully short !) blog post about how social utilities like Google and Facebook have essentially become reputation engines powering the emergence of collaborative consumption startups like Airbnb and TaskRabbit.

Dixon’s argument is that Google search has replaced social proof — Um okay sure. This kind of oversimplification overlooks the major

The premise behind emerging reputation-startups like Klout is that people will eventually outsource stuff like online reputation — due to being overwhelmed and blindsided by the current Internet to an  IRL thrust. Because Google search is not always a meritocracy — and somebody can totally cash in on that.

Forreals yo; In third grade being the unique and uncommon  ‘Alexia Tsotsis‘ sucked, but, in adult life I’m all like,”Hell yeah!” As the only Alexia Tsotsis in the world right now I feel pretty damn good – Woot. These things are important, but equally not.

Because what if you have a more ubiquitous name , like Sean Parker or Jason Johnson? Does Google or Facebook suffice as a reputation engine? No. And are you willing to pay more to show up more prominently. There is a business in this, I swear,

“Today, for the first time, you can get background information on almost any prospective counterparty by searching Google, Facebook etc. Or put more simply: we finally have an internet of people.”

So sure Dixon, who is usually on point, conflates the fact that the Internet is now in everyone’s pocket with the fact that all-recognizable online identity now assumes that everything is available.

Says our resident digital anthropologist Josh Constine, “I think anyone who’s buying or selling something online is reasonably likely to be publicly searchable. Especially if they’ve done something shady. At that point, it doesn’t matter what social networks or sites they use. Someone else just has to tweet or blog their name to tie a record of their past dealings to them.”

I totally trust someone on Craigslist to rent me their apartment, but not to make out with, for example.

Succinctly, the major point still is ; The Internet has a long ways to go if it wants to rock and roll. Sure, enough said.

45 Privacy Changes Facebook Will Make To Comply With Data Protection Law
by Josh Constine

In 2012, Facebook will be making 45 privacy-related changes to comply with the recommendations of an audit by Ireland’s Office of the Data Protection Commissioner (DPC) released today. Below I’ve compiled a roadmap of all the changes Facebook will implement based on the the 149 pages of DPC recommendations and how the social network says it will address them.

First, read my analysis of the audit’s findings from this morning. It explains why these changes won’t seriously interfere with Facebook’s business model or product development. That’s very good news for Facebook. Still, complying with the audit’s recommendations could prevent the company from building a huge stockpile of historical data for some unknown later use.

The changes mostly deal with how long Facebook retains data, and how people are educated about Facebook’s usage of that data. Some will require engineering work, such as irrevocably deleting user data within 40 days of an account deletion request. Others will simply see Facebook adding additional links or messaging within the product to improve transparency and user understanding.

Facebook avoided having to make some big changes that could have hurt its business, such as needing users to explicitly opt in to ad targeting based on their personal data. It also won’t have to discontinue its facial recognition feature, or requires users to opt into having their content used in Sponsored Stories ads.

Here are the 45 changes Facebook will implement and their due dates:

Privacy and Data Use Policy
Simplify the explanations of its Data Use Policy- End of Q1 2012
Add a mechanism for controlling personal data to the registration process – End of Q1 2012
Increase the size of links to the privacy policy and statement of rights in the registration process -  End of February 2012
Add privacy policy, statement of rights, and Help Center links to the left side of the Facebook home page – End of February 2012

Advertising Use of User Data
Clarify how it employs user data in ad targeting to ensure full transparency – End of Q1 2012
Limit data collection from social plugins, restrict access to this data, and delete it on schedule, though social plugin data is not currently used in ad targeting – Immediately
Move option to opt out of having one’s content shown in social ads from the Account Settings to the Privacy Settings – End of Q1 2012
Prior to implementation, discuss any plans to provide individuals’ profile pictures and names to third parties for advertising purposes – Ongoing
Switch from retaining ad-click data indefinitely to a 2 year retention period – Review in July 2012

Access Requests
If identifiable personal data of users or non-users is held, it must be provided in response to an access request within 40 days – Beginning in January 2012
Provide easier access to this data via the profile, Activity Log, and Download Your Information tool – Beginning in January 2012

Retention of Data
Clarify to users how deleted data such as received friend requests and removed tags is retained – End of Q1 2012
Provide users with the ability to delete friend requests, pokes, tages, posts, and messages on a per item basis – Begin in Q1 2012, show progress by July 2012.
Change Groups invitations so user won’t appear as members until they’ve visited the Group and been given an easy way to leave – End of Q1 2012
Delete personal data once the purpose for which it was collected has ceased – Immediate, ongoing, review in July 2012
Delete all social plugin impression data with 90 days of a website visit
For non-users and logged out users, delete social plugin impression data within 10 days
Anonymize data about a user’s searches on Facebook with 6 months
Anonymize all ad click data after 2 years
Significantly shorten the retention period of log-in information
Educate users through the Data Use Policy about recording of login activity across browsers and devices – End of Q1 2012
Work with the DPC to identify an acceptable retention period of data from inactive or deactivated accounts – July 2012

Third-Party Apps
Roll out updated granular data permissions dialog box to all applications – End of February 2012, review in July 2012
Clarify that use of an app is visible to friends by default (Facebook has fixed this with the audience selector of its granular data permissions dialog box) – Review in July 2012
Educate users on the importance of reading app privacy policies, possibly increase size of links to report an app or view app its privacy policy in the data permissions dialog box – End of February 2012
Implement a tool that determines if links to app privacy policies are live. First, Facebook will asses the technical feasibility of such as tool – Review progress towards implementation in July 2012
Examine alternative privacy controls for allowing friends to provide one’s data to applications, as currently users must turn off apps entirely to prevent friends from giving apps their data – Report back to DPC in July 2012
Investigate technical solutions to reduce risk of abuse of authorization tokens via one app transferring a token to another – Immediate assessment, solution by end of Q1 2012
Expand mesaging to developers regarding policy prohibiting sharing of authorization tokens –  End of January 2012
Refine automated tools that detect and prevent abuse of user data by developers – Progress review in July 2012
Disclosures to Third Parties
Improve system for disclosing data to law enforcement by requiring validation from a senior officer and a full explanation for why the data is needed – Commence in January 2012, review in July 2012
Facial Recognition / Tag Suggest
Notify users that Tag Suggest exists with a series of home page prompts and link to an explanation of how it works – First week of January 2012
Prior to implementation, discuss with DPC  any plans to extend tag suggest to allow suggestions beyond confirmed friends – Ongoing
Security
Formally document security policies and procedures – Review in July 2012
Monitor employees to ensure user password resets aren’t used to gain unauthorized access to user data – End of January 2012
Implement a new access provisioning tool to allow for fine-grained, role-specific control of employee access to user data to ensure all access is authorized – Review in July 2012
Deletion of Accounts
Continue devoting engineering resources towards improving the system that irrevocably deletes user accounts and data within 40 days of receipt of a deletion request – Review in July 2012
Friend Finder
Provide education about and review alternatives for reducing risks inherent in transmitting contact information via plain text for use in the contact sync feature – End of Q1 2012
Add text explaining that deactivating the contact sync feature does not remove previously synced data – End of Q1 2012
Prevent Pages that have uploaded email addresses to send messages to European users or non-users via geoblocking of major EU domains and warn businesses using the feature about ePrivacy law – Geoblocking immediately, warnings by end of Q1 2012
Tagging
Review implications of DPC’s recommendation to allow users to prevent themselves from being tagged in photos or other content – In advance of July 2012
Posting On Other Profiles
Review implications of DPC’s recommendation that prior to posting, users be shown how broad the audience will be for a potential post on the wall of another user, and notify users if that wall’s owner changes that audience size – In advance of July 2012
Facebook Credits
Add information to the Data Use Policy regarding Facebook’s role as a data controller and that information about a user’s use of Credits is linked to their account, and launch a privacy policy dedicated to its payments systems in approximately 6 months – End of Q1 2012
Compliance Management / Governance
Develop documented procedures for direct marketing by Facebook employees and train employees to ensure data protection – Completed
Review European data protection laws and consult with the DPC when developing new products or uses to ensure compliance with data protection law

Additionally, the DPC’s audit made statements, indicating its satisfaction with how Facebook handles these potentially controversial issues:
Cookies are not used for profiling or ad targeting
Apps were found to not be able to access user data without consent
Disabling Tag Suggest deletes a user’s facial recognition profile
User data is available to employees on a need-to-know basis
There is no threat to user photos during upload to Akamai or during deletion
The site protects against large-scale data harvesting through screen-scraping
User contact info, including phone numbers and email addresses, is only stored and not used unless users choose to supply email addresses for use in the Friend Finder
When users give Friend Finder access to their third-party email accounts and other services, their passwords are held securely and destroyed
Facebook has provided sufficient justification of its policy of refusing pseudonymous accounts
Facebook provides sufficient ways to report abuse on the site

The Definitive Guide To HTML5: 14 Predictions For 2012
by Contributor

Editor’s note: Guest contributor Ben Savage is the founder of Spaceport.io, a native Javascript and HTML5 platform for mobile game developers.

From tech titans like Zynga, Facebook, Microsoft, Google and Apple, to startups just launching, the battle lines of 2012 will be drawn across the landscape of HTML5. Below are 14 bold predictions for how HTML5 will evolve in 2012.

Welcome to a more interconnected web:

In 2012, HTML5 will be adding support for some really useful and cool APIs that allow one
website to connect to another.

For example, Zynga games on Facebook run inside of iframes. Using the new postMessage API these games will be able to communicate within the containing Facebook frame directly. Before HTML5, inter-window communication had to rely on a remote server – or use unreliable hacks.

Another exciting addition is CORS (Cross Origin Resource Sharing). This will make it much easier for different websites to share information with one another. For example, CORS will enable startups to create photo-editing services that download your photos from Facebook, let you modify them, and then re-upload them – again without having to resort to ugly hacks.

With all of the new semantic information (see Semantics and Microdata) available with HTML5, it will become much easier to create web tools that extract information from web pages. As a result, you can expect to see a plethora of new mashup services, as well as better browser modes (like readers and translators).

Web browsers will look more like iPhones

Everyone loves Apple’s iOS. Now it’s coming to the HTML5 web. In 2012 your browsers will start
sporting push notifications, geolocation, and offline capable applications. Some browsers will likely adopt a more iOS-like user interface that will make the comparison all the more apt.

More and more applications will just be built in HTML5 instead of downloadable apps

If you’re like me, you already use web apps for email, calendars, and photo-sharing, but in 2012 more classes of applications will be HTML5 enabled. Next up, you can expect to see content creation apps like Inkscape and Illustrator emerge for HTML5 and start to catch on.

Internet Explorer & Microsoft will dramatically improve in coolness.

Internet explorer’s reputation will stop being “the browser where nothing works right” and start being “the fast browser”. Microsoft has made major investments into improving HTML5 performance that will give IE 10 a huge performance lead over competing browsers. Its hardware accelerated “canvas” will blow away all the other browsers in any speed test. Microsoft is also adding interesting ways for the HTML5 web and the desktop to work together that will really spice up its operating system. Having good support from IE will be the impetus that will really turn the tide in favor of authoring HTML5 applications.

Browser manufacturers will get into the App Store business

Taking a cue from Apple, browser manufacturers will start to realize that they are missing out by not being in the app store business. Google Chrome already has an integrated app-store as its splash page. Expect many other browsers to follow. This is actually a good thing for HTML5 application developers – it means more distribution opportunities for apps, although platform specific payment systems and platform revenue-shares will follow later on.

At least one major console game released or re-released using WebGL

In 2012, at least one AAA console game company is going to make the leap and decide to launch a 3D title on the web using WebGL instead of (or in addition to) creating a downloadable client. It might be a re-release of a well-known title (Like “Team Fortress 2″ or “Assassins Creed”), or another way to play a popular MMO (like “Eve Online” or “World of Warcraft”), or it may be an entirely new title launching for the first time.

Many more applications will use offline cache and will work offline

The offline application cache will dramatically improve the usability and speed of HTML5 apps. Querying a local database will allow applications to avoid a round-trip to the server, eliminating that laggy web-app feel that makes us all prefer native apps today.

In 2012, expect to see a few issues arise from this extended usage. You’ll lose your work by clearing your cache at least once or twice. Also expect security vulnerabilities to keep showing up that allow malicious applications to access private files stored on your computer by another
website.

HTML5 ads will become prevalent and overtake Flash ads

Website owners keen to monetize the increasingly large amount of traffic coming from iOS devices will demand HTML5 ads (rather than Flash ads). Startups will emerge to serve this market. These startups will solve the sand boxing, security, and authoring tools issues that this new market will face. Now that HTML5 is capable of doing everything that flash ads commonly do, it’s just a matter of time before they take over.

JavaScript will get a lot faster with better memory management and typed arrays

JavaScript has gotten really, really fast – it’s already among the world’s fastest scripting languages – but there is room for improvement. Google Chrome has started pushing the envelope on better memory management and garbage collection algorithms. This, combined with typed arrays, will bring JavaScript performance closer to more mature languages like Java.

Canvas will get hardware acceleration in more browsers (but no major mobile browsers)

Other browser makers will follow Internet Explorer’s lead and add hardware acceleration to their canvas implementations. Those that don’t will suffer a severe loss in mind-share. Firefox is most at-risk in this regard. If Mozilla fails to accelerate their canvas it risks being portrayed as the new IE — slow and bloated and burdened down with legacy code.

However, in 2012, no major mobile browsers will successfully roll out a hardware-accelerated canvas. We will have to wait until 2013 to start seeing that catch on.

People will play popular HTML5 games on their mobile devices from Zynga and others, but they will be very simple games

You can expect to see your friends playing games like Zynga Poker, Words with Friends, and Mafia Wars on their mobile phones, running purely in HTML5. These games will be played on both destination websites and within native applications (like the Facebook app).

However, successful HTML5 games on mobile devices will be limited to menu-based games, card games, board games, turn-based multiplayer games, and avatar customizer games. More complex and visually intensive Zynga “Ville” style games with isometric worlds or hundreds of animating sprites will not yet strike gold in 2012.

Facebook will release improved HTML5-based APIs that allow for more seamless integration with external websites

In its continued quest to be the de facto social-graph of the web, Facebook Connect will grow and expand to take advantage of new HTML5 features. This will allow even deeper and richer integration of Facebook connect with external websites and services.

Facebook will get a lot more seamlessly integrated with your desktop

Think drag-and-drop, file system access, photo synching, and widgets on your desktop. All of these features (and more) will start to blur the line between desktop and browser, bringing your social graph more closely into contact with your traditional desktop experience.

Apple will NOT fix HTML5 sound in mobile Safari

HTML5 sound used to work well in mobile Safari, back in the days iOS3. However, Apple disabled most of the API in iOS 4 and 5. It just introduces competition for iTunes — both the music store, and the App Store. In its continued fight to maintain total control over the Apple ecosystem, they will refrain from fixing HTML5 sound in 2012.

Fourteen years ago, in my first job where my title was “Information Architect,” I clashed with a designer. We were working at a large advertising agency that was known for stunning design work. The art directors wielded a level of power at the agency that I have never seen anywhere else, and the result over the decades was a portfolio of gorgeous print and TV ads. The design-first method had worked well for this agency, winning them awards and a long roster of Fortune 500 clients, so they naturally decided to use this approach in their newly launched web department, too.

Things went well for a while, until I attended a kickoff meeting for a new website project. The designer came to the meeting with an already completed graphic design, before any information had been provided about who the site was for or what it would do. This designer had been at the company longer than me, and she had been happily designing sites without an information architect for several months. As far as she was concerned, this was a process that worked well for her, and why shouldn’t it? She had complete control of the site, her designs looked lovely, and they were not in any way influenced by user needs, site goals, or reality.

What followed was a long, drawn-out battle for control of the site between me and the designer. This battle usually sounded something like this, played out again and again:

Me: And when you click on this button where does it take you?

Designer: I haven’t worked that out yet, but it’ll be fine.

At the time, I thought I had encountered a particularly obstinate designer, but in fact I had just bulldozed my way into the biggest challenge in information architecture (IA): navigating the line between beautiful design and usable IA. Because this was early in the web world, the agency had yet to learn about this balance between usability and design, and I hadn’t either. And in the intervening years, things haven’t changed much. Designers still want to make things beautiful, UXers still want to make things usable, and those two goals are frequently at odds. What has changed for me, though, is the approach I now take to working with designers.
1. Get the Right Designer on the Project

We don’t always have the luxury of selecting the designer who will bring our wireframes and prototypes to life, but on occasion this happens. All UXers should have a roster of designers who are UX-friendly who they can call when the opportunity arises. More and more frequently, I have clients who either ask us to handle design or ask for designer referrals. When this happens I always feel like I’ve won the lottery. I have a collection of designers I’ve met over the years who are great at working with highly functional sites; if you have the opportunity to influence the designer selection, you need to be ready to jump in with names and portfolios.
2. Don’t Just Throw Wireframes Over the Fence

Last year, I worked on an unusual project where the timeframe was so compressed that there was no time for wireframes. Instead I spent many, many hours each day on the phone with the designer discussing the interface, working out where each element should go and exactly how it should function. While I wouldn’t recommend this process as a rule, the end result was a beautiful working relationship and an interface that we were both thrilled with.

Many agencies are structured such that designers are just handed a stack of wireframes and told to execute on them. The end result tends to be either a site that looks like a very pretty version of the wireframes, or one that is only very loosely based on the UX design. To strike the right balance that prevents designers from either taking an overly literal interpretation of wireframes or from developing their own new interaction models, designers need to be involved early and often. As soon as you’ve got a few wireframes done, pull your designer in to start mocking up a visual design so you can work together through anything that needs to be rethought.
3. Give Designers Space to Do Their Thing

People go into design because they want to express their creativity, to play with shapes and color, and to have fun doing it. In some ways, information architects just come in and rain on designers’ parades by imposing structure and preferring the obvious over the unique. But there are designers out there — more and more all the time — who look forward to working with information architects because working off of wireframes makes their jobs easier. These designers still want to play and have fun, and (in the right place and time) new and interesting designs and interactions can make people happy, so it’s a good idea to include a design-centric section on sites that warrant it, where the information architecture takes a back seat to the design. This works for areas of a site that needs to provide a visceral feel for a brand, or portfolio sections of sites that need to showcase work or case studies. If you respect the designers’ need to create something beautiful, they are more likely to respect your need to create something usable.

4. Don’t Discount the Importance of Design

It’s important to remember, as Don Norman has famously said and Dana Chisnell recently reiterated, that beautiful design makes people happy. Good UX design is the backbone of good visual design, and one cannot exist without the other. Back when I was engaging the designer at my first IA job in thermonuclear warfare, I did it because I only barely registered design as something that mattered to the user experience. But the joy inherent in beautiful design is important as well, so sometimes when a designer overrides your UX design on aesthetic grounds, the designer is right. UXers need to weigh the pros and cons of all design decisions very carefully in order to determine where visual design should triumph over UX design, and vice versa.

There are still struggles, of course, and there are projects where designers want to go one direction and the UX team wants to go another. But I do seem to encounter fewer and fewer all-out wars between design and UX teams. When designers and UXers work well together, the ultimate winners are the users, who get a product that is not only easy to use but lovely to interact with.

UX Magazine is a Mashable publishing partner that offers instruction, opinion and analysis on the field of user experience. The following article is reprinted with the publisher’s permission.

It was published in Mashable.

Logo_creationProcess -Macinfosoft

History behind the Logos of top companies

By tapping into Albert Einstein’s idea of “spooky action at a distance,” researchers at the University of Copenhagen’s Niels Bohr Institute have discovered what might be the key to completely secure data transfer — keeping particles “entangled” for up to an hour. Until now, the link between two entangled systems could only be maintained for a fraction of a second. This development could enable a direct link between two systems of communication — you do something to one and the other will “know.” Although limited to the lab right now, scientists are working on practical applications for networking and the internets. Hey, SSH maybe it’s time you started watching your back. Check out the full PR after the break.

How to Set Up Your Writing as a Real Business

Chip MacGregor worked as an author, editor, and publisher before starting his literary agency. In answering a question at his blog, he provides down-to-earth advice on the basics of setting up an office, organization system, and career as a writer.

Photo by Bright Meadow.

Chantrelle asked, “How do you officially set up your writing business? What are the benefits to treating your writing business as a ‘real job’ by setting it up in a professional manner? And what have you done to make that happen?”

Let me offer a handful of thoughts for you…

1. Find a place. Make this your “writing” place and designate it as your office.

2. Make that your official “home office,” then read up on what the IRS will allow you as a tax deduction.

3. Establish a writing time. For most authors, that’s simply “morning.” Protect a time each day when you can do some actual “writing” and not just checking email, answering letters, meeting people for coffee, etc. When I started, I set aside 6 to 8 every morning. (I had young kids. Later wouldn’t have worked. I hate mornings.) Tom Wolfe starts writing at 9 and stops at noon. Find a time that works, in which you’ll just WRITE.

4. Create a filing system. (“Alphabetical by title or author” works well. Don’t rely on the “Eureka!” system.)

5. Set up a bank account that is just for your business. Sign up for PayPal.

6. Set up your address book. Keep emails and phone numbers handy…and if you want to move into the bold new world of 1996, invest in a phone or something that will keep those handy.

7. Create a calendar. Not just for your day, but for the big projects you’ve got. It’ll help you figure out what you’re writing when. It’ll also remind you that you’ve got to take Fiona to the orthodontist.

8. Group similar activities. Do all your mail at one time. Group your phone calls back to back so you get through them all. Ditto email, if that were possible. Things that are “occasional but regular” should be scheduled — for example, I look at submissions every Friday morning.

9. Create a budget. How much do you expect to make this year? How much do you expect to spend? (Having more of the former makes for a better business, by the way.)

10. Create a to-do list. Every day. Work through it. On Friday (or every other Friday) start at the bottom and work up – that’ll prevent you from never doing the one task you hate.

11. Create a contact list. Capture names and email addresses.

12. Invest in a separate business phone line or business cell phone.

13. Invest in a web site and business cards.

14. Make sure you’ve got quality high-speed internet. (Duh.)

15. Invest in the help you need – training or people or space or tools.

16. Invest in a great computer and the software you’ll need.

17. Invest is a good printer, preferably with a scanner.

18. Invest in yourself — take a class, attend a conference, join a support group, get therapy, whatever it is you need to grow. Buy a good dictionary and thesaurus.

19. Learn to keep good records. If you need a class on it, take one. (There are even personal organization trainers who will help you get organized. Talk to someone like Tiffany Colter about that.)

20. Learn about taxes — expenses, etc.

And the BEST advice? Write regularly. If you don’t do that, you won’t make a living at this.

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.

Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

– A quote taken from a speech made by Steve Jobs in 2005 at Standford University