Happy New Year!

New year, new beginnings...

So, how to keep relevant and employed in the new year? That's the million dollar question. Here are a few considerations and if you see yourself answering yes to these questions, be sure to keep reading!

1. Does your job seems mindless to you? You just go in hang out and go home? Do you just push paper around? Can a monkey do your job? (Well, not a real monkey. But someone out of college or an illegal immigrant?) Are you making a decent salary doing it?

2. Are you keeping up with your industry? Still using old ways? Don't know about the new technologies in your industry? Not current on your industry certifications?

3. Has business been declining? Have there been less people every year at work? Is management rumbling about business being bad? People NOT being hired? Seeing more managers than actual workers?

4. New companies and/or technology in your industry taking over and doing better? Your company fighting to be relevant?

These are just a few off the top. But if you've agreed or relate, you're in for a shock. Still confused, I'll elaborate with an example.

The US Post Office.

10 years ago, they gave the packaging business and express mail away to UPS and FedEx. They spent billions on technology to install high speed readers than handled letter mail.

Well, there was this thing called the internet and email that came around and decimated their letter business.

Now the post office is regulated and constrained. Unable to move into new businesses, so they will shrink to a point where they will almost disappear and another 5-10 years.

Things they should have gone into.

1. Maps. Most people don't realize, but they have the most up to date maps and business address of anyone. After all they have to deliver it. That data is extremely valuable to providers, such as Google Maps, Bing Maps and GPS manufacturers. The issues they face today, is the ability to update them. The post office does this on a daily basis.

2. Secure email. They can provide a secure email account, easily. Think about it, no fake accounts. Like a PO box, but you have to go to the post office to validate with a federal ID. No fake accounts, these people would be the people they say they are. Spam? A thing of the past. If you aren't on the approved sender list, then it gets junked. You have to send a person the mail first and they need to reply to send future mail.

3. Drop ship locations. Like the UPS stores. They have the MOST locations of any retailer. Accept packages from your competitors. Amazon also has a "Locker" at select locations.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html/?nodeId=200689010

How to avoid this?

This is hard. In the end, it's up to you the individual. NOT your company.

Most companies have a large middle and upper management with lots of internal politics. Things won't change, it's what's wrong with the government now. But that's another story. So ultimately, it's up to you, because people will always save themselves first. It's rare that they don't, but don't be upset when they don't. They have families and priorities also.

The best example I can use, is myself. You can tweak the information to benefit you.

1. Check Monster. Are there a lot of positions available in the industry doing what you do? Is the job in demand? If you see the salary declining... as in desktop support becoming a $15 an hour job vs a $80,000. It's time to get out.

2. Keep up with your industry. Read blogs, news, trade journals, etc. Learn the new technology that comes to your industry.

3. Partake in new things at your company. New projects, new technology, etc. Go with it and don't fight it. It may help you in your new job.

Cash is king. Make money work for you.

I hear this all the time. People making large cash deposits on low interest loans. Regardless of it being a home, car, credit card, etc. In the long run you lose money even more money.

Due to a lack of a proper financial education, most of us actually get financial advice from the people closest to us. Our parents. Now like most people, your parents aren't wealthy millionaires. Chances are they've worked most of their lives, lived frugally and have scrapped by to have the little that they have.

Do you ever wonder if there is a better way? I have. So I did some research and learned some things on my own, rather than take advice blindly. Would you take restaurant advice from someone who's never opened or ran one? Do you take advice on how to beat a ticket from someone who's never beat one? You get the idea.

It's always a debate, so I've put it down in a spreadsheet below. Click on the link to see the full view. It should be self explanatory, but inc ase you do have questions I'll sum it up after the link.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/pub?hl=en_US&hl=en_US&key=0AjheyVNqbU2cdGo1ZU8xdXJ1bHBzdmJPd1FvcUQ1SWc&single=true&gid=0&output=html&ndplr=1

In the spreadsheet there are 2 separate sections. The top is someone who invested their money and below is someone who paid off debt first before saving.

As you can see I've use a real mutual fund in the example with 10 years worth of returns.

In the mad dash to save $3,700 in interest they sacrificed $16,000 in gains.

So, the big questions is do you want to save $3,700 or make $16,000? I'd rather have the $16,000 in cash. Wouldnt' you?

Not all debt is created equal...

What does this mean? Not all debt is the same. Some debt is good. Believe it or not, paying off debt can cost you more money than you imagine.

What do I mean? Here's an example:

Low interest debt, which is anything in single digits, can actually work to your benefit. The best example is my previous post: The Power of Saving Early You can apply that to this. So you have low interest debt (Student loans, car loans, mortgage) and want to pay it off first before saving. BAD! Why you ask? If you look at the break down in the spreadsheet. You avoid saving and paying off debt of $30,000. You lose $48,000 in trying to catch up for retirement vs saving early and it costing you $12,000. Not only that, you also lose in the financial gains you may missed out on, which is highlighted in the spreadsheet below:

https://spreadsheets.google.com/a/atchan.com/spreadsheet/ccc?hl=en_US&hl=en_US&key=t5hhFiqDC2bW7saKVZn8AHA&authkey=CIWIzKAP#gid=0

Now, in the example above.

Person B paid of debt early and was debt phobic. They started saving later and managed to save a nice $1.5 million.

Person A started saving early and paid off their debt slowly. They have $3 million dollars saved for retirement.

Who would you rather be? Person A I hope.

The Power of Saving Early

So, here's a graph I saw in my previous life as Financial Advisor and recreated. (The link is below.) We demonstrated the power of saving early, to convince people to start saving early. Initially I always thought of it as marketing, until I actually put it together in a spreadsheet.

Here's the SHOCKING part. If you look...

Person A saved $2000 a year starting at 21 and saved until 26 ($12,000). To get $1,510,252.43 for retirement.

Person B started late at 27 and had to save until 65 ($78,000). To get $1,532,182.84 for retirement.

It costs $66,000 more, because they started late, to get ONLY $21,930.41 more in savings for retirement.

If you truly think about it, it's only $77 per check every 2 weeks or $167 month or $5.48 a day to save the $2000 a year.

It's AMAZING how college graduates or even high school students aren't taught this in school.

Check out the link below: https://spreadsheets0.google.com/a/atchan.com/pub?hl=en&hl=en&key=0AjheyVNqbU2cdHhlT1FPZ1JjMjdhNHNrdlBnZkR6M2c&output=html

* Based on a rate of return of 12% per year. I'll show you how in another post! Stay tuned!

Happy New Year! New online identity!

For those of you who run your own business, work in marketing or want an online presence this year (or anytime), you'll need to establish your own identity/persona.

I've done this with atchan. If you need help, reach out to me. So here are some basic steps:

1. Decide what your goal is.

2. Pick an identity that isn't online. Create something and google it. If it comes up, chances are it's taken. If not, great!

3. Check to see if the domain is taken. Click this link and check on Godaddy.com to see if your name as a domain is available. If so, buy the .com for around $8. Don't buy the additional services, you don't need them.

4. Establish email for your domain. It's free. You may need some technical help with this.
http://www.google.com/apps/intl/en/group/index.html

5. Go to, and register yourself and your new identity (This is only a few, depends on what you are looking to do.):
http://www.youtube.com/
http://www.blogger.com/
http://www.facebook.com/
http://www.twitter.com/

6. Content is up to you.

Mind you this is only a start.

iPhone upgrade warning....

Happy Holiday's everyone!

So I spent my holiday in a frantic trying to recover the data from a failed update. Apparently you can't migrate your data from iPhone OS 1.1.1 to 3.1.3 . iTunes doesn't tell you this and all the internet searches say "It's easy." NO it's not. Not sure if it's Apple propaganda or not. Good luck getting support for an out of warranty Apple device.

The firmware update happend flawlessly. The phone came back and booted into the home screen. Then it said to restore the data. After that the phone stayed on the Apple logo and the status bar never moves.

An update without the users data is useless...

BUT! I have a fix and managed to learn a few things...

1. BACK UP! Always back up before you perform any upgrade or update!

2. Apple sucks for backwards compatibility. They REALLY aren't backward compatible friendly. If the device is "Out of scope" it's just not supported. Like 64-bit on older iMacs that have a 64-bit processor, but due to a bios lock you can't run Snow Leopard in 64bit mode. WHY?? Oh, that's right. I have to buy a new iMac because the one that's only 3 years old isn't supported. End of life...

3. It's NOT easy locating Apple fixes in online searches. I pull up A LOT of pages telling you how to do it. Not many, when it fails and it does fail.

4. Apple.com support KB's sucks even more. Their searches are almost useless.

So, how did I recover?

1. Look for where your back up is stored. The file names won't look like anything you know. I had to go by the date and time it was modified. Copy the entire folder to a USB drive or other locations. DO NOT use the original files. You may need to go back to them.

On a Mac: ~/Library/Application Support/MobileSync/Backup/
On Windows XP: \Documents and Settings\(username)\Application Data\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup\
On Windows Vista and Windows 7: \Users\(username)\AppData\Roaming\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup\

2. I located an app. http://www.iphonebackupextractor.com/ It saved my life for $25.

3. I extracted the data from the files and there is no easy way to get the files back on the phone. EXCEPT... to export the Contacts as CSV files and Calendar as iCal file.

Both Hotmail and Gmail support Active Sync. I suggest importing them into those mail clients and use Active Sync to get your mail. This will also provide an online back up for all your contacts so in the future something like this won't be a disaster.

I hope this helps.

Browser Has Been Hijacked ?

• Home page or other settings change on your computer. Links are added that point to websites that you'd usually avoid.
• You can't navigate to certain web pages, such as antispyware and other security software sites.
• A seemingly endless barrage of ads pops up on your screen.
• New toolbars or Favorites are installed that give you icons and links to web pages that you don't want.
• Your computer runs sluggishly. Malicious software can slow down your computer.

The following six tips can help restore your browser's settings:

1. Stop cascading pop-up windows. If endless pop-up windows appear on your screen, you'll probably want to stop them first. To do this in Microsoft Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP, or Windows 2000 while using Internet Explorer:
   • Press CTRL+ALT+DEL, click Task Manager, and then click the Processes tab.
   • Click IEXPLORE.EXE, and then click the End Processbutton.
   This closes all instances of Internet Explorer. Then you can re-open the program to continue browsing as usual. To help prevent future attacks, you should also have a pop-up blocker turned on.
   To turn on the pop-up blocker in Internet Explorer 8 click theTools button (the gear icon), point to Pop-up Blocker, and then click Turn On Pop-Up Blocker.
   To turn on the pop-up blocker in Internet Explorer 7:
   • Click Tools menu, click Internet Options, and then click the Privacy tab.
   • In the Pop-up Blocker box, select the Block pop-upscheck box. Click OK.
   If you still experience the other effects of a hijacked web browser, try the following:
2. Install Microsoft Security Essentials or another antivirus and antispyware program. Microsoft Security Essentials is free software that will help protect your computer from malicious software such as viruses or spyware. Many browser hijacking programs can be identified and removed by downloading, installing, and running Microsoft Security Essentials or a similar tool.
3. Run the Malicious Software Removal Tool . This can catch some, but not all, kinds of hijacking software.
4. Reset Internet Explorer settings. If you're using Internet Explorer and your home page has been changed, you can often reset it yourself.
   Note If you use Microsoft Security Essentials, Forefront Client Security, Windows Defender, or the Windows Malicious Software Removal Tool and these tools have detected and removed hijacking software from your computer, these tools might change your home page and your search page to help protect against the malicious software.
   For more information and step-by-step instructions, see How to restore your Internet Explorer home page and search page preferences.
5. Disable add-ons. Many browser hijackings come from add-ons, also known as ActiveX controls, browser extensions, browser helper objects, or toolbars. These items can improve your experience on a website by providing multimedia or interactive content, such as animations. However, some add-ons can cause your computer to stop responding or display content that you don't want, such as pop-up ads.
   To learn how to disable add-ons in Windows Vista or Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2), read How do browser add-ons affect my computer?
6. Get more help. call 1-866- PC safety
7. go online to Here let system try and fix these issues for you.

This is a combo of article posted on the Microsoft site.

Taken from http://blog.mir.net/2010/10/browser-has-been-hijacked.html . Great post Jay!