SLO County News BlogGolf, Wine, Real Estate, Business & Travel NewsGood Morning America from SLOSunday, October 31, 2004Good Morning America segment to be filmed at Hearst Castle will air Nov. 14 and will boost tourism in off-season, officials say. ABC network's "Good Morning America" will film a travel segment at Hearst Castle on Thursday.The "Weekend Window" segment -- to be broadcast Nov. 14 -- will feature historical and tourism information about the castle. Hoyt Fields, the castle's museum director, will do on-camera duties for the California Department of Parks and Recreation, which owns and operates the castle. 'Good Morning America' visit seen as a boon to business - Tribune Searching LocallySaturday, October 30, 2004According to a recent consumer search behavior study conducted by BizRate.com and The Kelsey Group of 3,887 online respondents, the notion of "local is not lost on users. More than 74 percent of survey respondents said that they perform local searches. The data also showed that, on average, 27 percent of their total search behavior was for local information. Nearly 75 percent of local search users indicated the relevance and completeness of local information online had either somewhat or significantly improved versus a year ago. Coupled with the strong performance of mapping sites and Internet Yellow Pages sites, the use of the Internet for finding local information should accelerate over time.We certainly intend for SLO Pages to be an effective tool in your local searches for San Luis Obispo County businesses and attractions. Local and Shopping Search Are Growing Among Internet Users Finding You in SLOFriday, October 29, 2004Many search engines now offer "local" search options to help you find a restaurant, a hotel or an attraction in the area you live or are visiting. However, most are ineffective. Here at SLO Pages, we spend considerable time searching the internet for San Luis Obispo County websites to add to our directory. Unfortunately, many of our local websites are difficult or impossible to find.Local search can be improved simply by properly including local information in your web pages. If your web page is properly optimized and also tuned for local search, then customers will know to frequent your business when they need particular goods or services - and we can list you at SLO Pages! Local Search; Still A Long Way To Go SLO's Your Other TeacherThursday, October 28, 2004We found some more noteworthy SLO Pages today in Arroyo Grande. Using Yahoo! News advanced search, we've discovered a local "online" business we'd like to introduce - YourOtherTeacher.com.In a recent press release we learned that YourOtherTeacher.com, Inc. was founded in 2002. Its corporate mission is to create a centralized portal where students can overcome difficult subjects, increase knowledge, and make learning easier. New Online Tutoring and Supplemental Instruction Company Fills a Gap in "No Child Left Behind" Implementation "The basic idea is simple," says founder Jeff Jones, an engineering professor at Cuesta College in San Luis Obispo, California. "Provide substantial content using the technology to make it fast, easy and convenient. We’re not about flashy animations." Rosalie Mendez, who's running a number of math courses for YourOtherTeacher.com, agrees. "Many of the middle-class students I work with are as badly in need of supplemental instruction as students from the poorest neighborhoods. Because an online service like ours is more efficient than a brick-and-mortar learning center, we can offer services at a rate that those middle-class families can afford. It gives me a lot of satisfaction to know I'm helping students who might not be able to get assistance otherwise." YourOtherTeacher.com SLO's Green Car JournalWednesday, October 27, 2004From time to time, we like to highlight useful, informative, creative and/or unique "SLO Pages" we've found in the County.Today, while reading a press release regarding an article in Green Car Journal about an alternative "green" fuel - Biodiesel, we were reminded that Green Car Journal is published in San Luis Obispo - and we found that they publish website containing a wealth of useful information on hybrid car technology, electic vehicles, and alternative fuels such as hydrogen and biodiesel! According to the press release, "There's a fuel 'grown' in America that could help relieve the burden of relying on imported oil, requiring little or no engine modifications for its use. Bio-based and completely compatible with conventional diesel fuel, it is much cleaner burning than petrodiesel and is biodegradable, too." Green Car Journal Publishes 'The Truth About Biodiesel' - prnewswire.com With a little looking around, I learned that Green Car Journal's editor and publisher - San Luis Obispo's Ron Cogan - is president of the Green Car Group, a publishing, consulting and public relations firm that specializes in automobiles and the environment. As editor and publisher of the Green Car Journal industry newsletter and a former editor at Motor Trend magazine, he has focused on advanced technology and alternative fuel vehicles for the past 15 years. He is also the author of the cars.com special Batteries Included. The following information about Green Car Journal and its publisher can be found on their website: The Green Car Journal consumer magazine offers a unique perspective that's largely absent from mainstream automotive magazines: consistent and thorough coverage of vehicles and technologies that takes environmental performance into account. This is a reflection of Green Car Journal editor and publisher Ron Cogan's strong belief that automobiles and the environment are not mutually exclusive. Simply, when armed with the right information, drivers can and increasingly will choose vehicles offering the function and features they desire that also happen to have a lesser environmental impact. Green Car Journal's mission is to inform and entertain while also encouraging understanding of the exciting and environmentally positive vehicles in new car showrooms today, as well as those soon to come. It does this with the same kind of exciting features and technical presentations that Cogan has authored for mainstream automotive and science publications for years. The difference is that in this magazine, environmental thinking is always part of the presentation. The magazine benefits from the in-depth reporting that's long been provided by the award-winning Green Car newsletter, an important information source that's been read by executives and decision-makers in the auto industry for over 14 years. It also benefits from Cogan's 29 years as an editor and auto writer - including six years as feature editor on the staff of Motor Trend - that has found him testing production, developmental, and prototype cars around the world and explaining their importance to readers. Ron Cogan is first and foremost a "car guy," which means the presentations in Green Car Journal will always focus on the vehicles that move us...along with their important features that speak to our environmental sensibilities. Green Car Journal Online Andrew Sullivan endorses KerryTuesday, October 26, 2004While we don't intend to make our site political, today's article by Republican Andrew Sullivan is the most balanced commentary I've read or heard during this entire campaign. Regardless of your view, this is a must read.WHY I AM SUPPORTING JOHN KERRY. Risk Management - tnr.com "The greatest weakness of the war effort so far has been the way it has become a partisan affair. This is the fault of both sides: the Rove-like opportunists on the right and the Moore-like haters on the left. But in wartime, a president bears the greater responsibility for keeping the country united. And this president has fundamentally failed in this respect. I want this war to be as bipartisan as the cold war, to bring both parties to the supreme task in front of us, to offer differing tactics and arguments and personnel in pursuit of the same cause. This is not, should not be, and one day cannot be, Bush's war. And the more it is, the more America loses, and our enemies gain." -- Andrew Sullivan SLO's Art Cafe on Oprah this ThursdayMonday, October 25, 2004Remember the news about Oprah visiting SLO and liking her sandwich at Art Cafe so much she bought into the busines? Well, the story is on Oprah this Thursday! You can thank by wife for the news :) The original article about her visit is provided below:SLO's Art Cafe wins over queen of talk -- tribune Tasty sandwich makes such an impression on Oprah Winfrey that she's investing in the cafe. Oprah Winfrey found a lot more than she bargained for between two slices of white pepper-jack bread in San Luis Obispo a few weeks ago. Nathan Welton, The Tribune -- 7/26/04 New Model for SLO Health CareSunday, October 24, 2004Gautam Bhakta, his nurse and a bag of exam equipment will come to you. Gautam Bhakta's open-access, prepaid care could provide an attractive option for patients seeking more personal attention and fewer HMO hassles. It comes at a cost - a $1500/yr retainer fee - but provides unfettered access to the doctor, who remains on call for a small, select set of patients. Dr. Bhakta can now spend up to 45 minutes with 7-8 patients per day, instead of the HMO model of 10 minutes with up to 20-30 patients per day. Some may critisize this new model as only serving the rich, however, Bhakta is serving at least one retired patient living on a fixed income in a mobile home park who finds this model worth the cost. With a broken health care system, having other options is certainly attractive and something I'll look into further - especially when I go to pay my next $10k/yr insurance premium payment.A creative model for health care - Tribune SLO BloggersSaturday, October 23, 2004I ran across an old article by Dan Bricklin on Small Business Blogging today, outlining some examples of how small business can make effective use of blogs.Small Business Blogging - dan bricklin At SLO Pages, we've spent quite a bit of time recently looking around for local San Luis Obispo blogs to add to our Community pages. As expected, we've found a good number of local personal blogs, a surprising number of Cal Poly student blogs, but only two local small business blogs. However, these 2 blogs provide perfect examples of effective use of blogging for small businesses. I have been following a blog by Keith Byrd, a local independent realtor, for several months now. His blog provides the latest news and statistics on San Luis Obispo Real Estate. For instance, today, you can learn about some interesting price reductions on businesses and homes for sale. If you dig a little deeper, you'll find that Keith is quite adept at marketing his realty business. He drives around in a PT Cruiser with a surfboard on top advertising his business. His website is packed with local community and real estate information, giving those search engines lots of content to digest. He also authors locallinks.com and slolinks.com which direct potential clients to his website at slocountyhomes.com. Keith Byrd - SLO County Homes The other business blog I found is by another local web designer - Kyle Neath. From what I gather from his blog, Kyle is a Cal Poly student providing web design services for San Luis Obispo, however, I just learned that Kyle has recently taken employment at a local web design firm. His blog design is one of my favorites and his posts are both interesting and useful. Like Keith Byrd, Kyle is another master at promoting his Kyle Neath - Warpspire As far as personal blogs go, two local blogs stand out there too. These 2 San Luis Obispo County bloggers provide nice, clean designs along with interesting reading. slo lane m.eandering streamies Support your local SLO Bloggers! SLO Film FestivalFriday, October 22, 2004Time to start adding in some local news to the SLO Pages Blog...The 11th annual San Luis Obispo International Film Festival kicks off at 5:30 p.m. Thursday with "Opening Night Reception: A Celebration of Festivals Past and Present" at First Bank of San Luis Obispo downtown. Tickets for the opening night event are $15. Passes for the film festival, which runs Oct. 21-24 and Oct. 29-31, are available at Boo Boo Records in San Luis Obispo, from the San Luis Obispo Chamber of Commerce, on the Web at www.slofilmfest.org or by calling 546-3456. Passes cost $20, $40, $125 and $200. On Friday, the Founder's Selection of "Marty" from 1955 will be presented as a tribute to longtime festival director Mary A. Harris at 6:30 p.m. at the Palm Theatre on Palm Street. The festival will honor Academy Award-winning actress Eva Marie Saint with the King Vidor Lifetime Achievement Award at 7 p.m. Saturday at the Fremont Theatre on Monterey Street. Saint will be on hand to accept the award and view the screening of "All Fall Down," a 1962 film in which she co-starred with Warren Beatty. More than 90 films were screened by a panel for the festival, and the best of the best will be shown at 4 p.m. Oct. 30 at the Palm Theatre. An awards ceremony will follow the screenings. The festival will conclude Oct. 31 at the Festival 10 Cinemas in Arroyo Grande with a Halloween Night Sing-Along featuring "Grease," starring John Travolta and Olivia Newton John, from 7 to 9:20 p.m. For more information and a schedule, call 546-3456 or visit www.slofilmfest.org. Passes now on sale for SLO Film Festival - tpr SLO Pages Team DesignThursday, October 21, 2004Imagine running design ideas by your client online, in real-time, getting instant "visual" feedback. Check out Imagination Cubed - a prototype from GE of a collaborative drawing space you can invite friends, clients or co-workers to join you in. You can chat, save or print your work and replay the entire process of creating the drawing. It's even fun to boot!Imagination Cubed - by GE Sending Large Files from SLOWednesday, October 20, 2004Clients often ask us how to best send large files to us or to other recipients. These clients recognize that e-mail is not the most efficient way to accomplish this. Many services, ISPs, and corporate gateways put a limit on the size of attachments to manage bandwidth. FTP is insecure, especially anonymous public servers where your stuff sits avaialable to anyone. At SLO Pages, we can simply upload a large file to our web server and send a hyperlink in an email.A web-based service called YouSendIt might be just the solution you need. A simple three-step web page allows you upload your file(s), identify your recipient, and send an inviation for them to retrieve the file. Your files are available for seven days. Secure file transfers are available. The service is free. YouSendIt offers a file link you can embed on your web site to make it easy for your visitors to send you files up to 1 GB in size. They also ofer an Enterprise Server product. YouSendIt Basic SLO Pages Design PrinciplesSunday, October 17, 2004Here's an article recently posted by WebProNews.com outlining some simple web design principles to consider for your San Luis Obispo County website. The article covers what information and links should be on your front page, navigation structure, suggestions for font size asnd line length, use of graphics, creating emphasis, download time, and the importance of testing. Here at SLO Pages, we've found many websites that could be improved significanty simply by making some minor changes based on thsese guidelines. Learning when to use GIF vs. JPG files is a good first step!Basic Web Design Principles - webpronews.com Broadband in San Luis ObispoThursday, October 14, 2004A majority of U.S. home Internet users now have broadband, according to a survey by NetRatings. Our informal polling at SLO Pages seems to back this statistic.According to Marc Ryan, senior director of analysis at the audience measurement company, while the total number of home Internet users has reached a plateau in the U.S., those who do use the Internet are adopting broadband at a rapid pace. Broadband users a majority in U.S. Does Your Website Do Your Talking?Wednesday, October 13, 2004It's time to start thinking of your website as an alternative and preferred way of communicating "directly" with your customers.Many San Luis Obispo County businesses spend significant time and money developing a web presence without clear objectives. Without specific goals, it is impossible to measure whether your website has effectively met them. Many local business websites are developed only because their customers have requested one or because they hope it will attract more business. However, very few of these websites effectively serve new or existing customers. One important goal to consider when pursuing an online presence is simply to reduce the number and length of customer phone calls you receive. Let your website do your talking! An effective small business website must do more than list your products or services and give instructions on how to contact you or find your office, but add value and save time by offering them the ability to do and learn the things they normally do by calling you - making reservations or appointments, requesting answers to frequently asked questions, or getting updated news or status - from your blog! The requests your customers normally make by phone should be an easy click or two away using your effective website. It's actually surprising just how few websites satisfy this simple goal. Even if your website fails to reduce the number of calls, you should at least be able to direct callers to your website for answers to reduce the length of calls. There are a variety of reasons that effective and adequate content is not shared online. Some businesses don't want to share too much information online. They're afraid that if they place too much information online, either their customers won't have a reason to visit their store or their competition will learn too much. For secure information, this is a valid concern, however much of this information can already be obtained, or has been obtained, by your competition by calling you on the phone. Determining what information to share online can usually be resolved by asking yourself whether you provide this information over the phone - or would if you could in the case of graphic or video content. If so, it should be on your website. However, a more common reason for ineffective and inadequate website content is that local web services often charge too much money or take too long to make desired updates to your website. Over time, clients simply quit asking for content to be added or changed. Many of our clients first contacted SLO Pages because their existing web firm proved unresponsive or seemed greedy. There should be little or no costs associated with minor changes to your site. In fact, in many cases, you should be able to make these changes yourself with no understanding of HTML or web technology. If there is information missing from your website that would be there if only you had the time and knowledge to do it yourself, then you need to consider a new web development firm! Make your SLO pages effective ones. Working Hard for the SLO LifeTuesday, October 12, 2004We in SLO, tout the wonders of the "SLO Life", a balanced life where work, play, family, community and service are equally valued and experienced. Our excellent year-round climate and lack of traffic enables much more time spent outdoors, than do most locales - and we take advantage of that. However, the cost of living in San Luis Obispo County is among the highest in the county, sometimes requiring that we work a little harder to maintain this SLO Life. But, is hard work an acceptable attribute of the SLO Life? Perhaps the SLO Life isn't or shouldn't be about balance, but about priorities. We can't balance "everything", but we can make it a priority to spend more time on "some things" - including working hard.This topic is a little off-subject for this blog, but in this field of web development and in the businesses of many of our clients, the pursuit of balance is often a challenge - or even "bunk" as described in an article I recently read in Fast Company. Below are some excerpts from, and link to, this article at Fast Company that describes why a balanced life is "bunk" and introduces the importance of priorities. The article contains some interesting perspectives on workaholics and outsourcing as well... Stewart Friedman, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School, and Sharon Lobel of Seattle University have a term for such folks: "happy workaholics." Friedman, who has long encouraged business leaders to pursue "whole" lives, thinks it's possible for leaders to be "poster children for balance," as he says. But he also agrees that conventional arguments for balance devalue the work half of the equation. "Work is an experience through which much of life's rewards and opportunities for service can be realized," he says. "Creating value for the world, for the next generation". The global economy is antibalance. For as much as Accenture and Google say they value an environment that allows workers balance, they're increasingly competing against companies that don't. You're competing against workers with a lot more to gain than you, who will work harder for less money to get the job done. This is the dark side of the "happy workaholic." Someday, all of us will have to become workaholics, happy or not, just to get by. Protest, if you like, against labor exploitation or unfair competition. The reality is, workers in India, China, Brazil, and, inevitably, everywhere else aren't stopping long to worry about it. They make our developed-world notion that workers actually are entitled to balance seem quaintly dated. For many, the great fallacy is not that we aspire to accomplishment but that we aspire to everything else, too. Unwilling to prioritize among things that all seem important, we instead invent for ourselves the possibility of having everything. Life is about setting priorities and making trade-offs; that's what grown-ups do. But in our all-or-nothing culture, resorting to those sorts of decisions is too often seen as a kind of failure. Seeking balance, we strive for achievement everywhere, all the time -- and we feel guilty and stressed out when, inevitably, we fall short. Balance, for what the word is worth, then becomes a lifelong quest -- balance among chapters rather than within each chapter. "It gets in people's heads that the ultimate goal is a 50-50 split between work and life," says work-life consultant Cali Williams Yost. "But there are times when I've happily devoted 80% of my time to work -- and other times when I couldn't." The tough part is recognizing the chapters for what they are -- just temporary episodes that together make up a coherent and satisfying whole. Those who succeed, says Zelman, are "the people who learn to dance with change, who create and ride the wave." They don't make decisions once or twice, but all the time. Balance is Bunk! - It's the central myth of the modern workplace: With a few compromises, you can have it all. But it's all wrong, and it's making us crazy. Here's how to have a life anyway. [fast company] Blogging your SLO BusinessMonday, October 11, 2004SLO Pages has setup blogs for several San Luis Obispo County business websites. These "business" blogs not only provide an effective and easy method for these businesses to keep their clients or customers up-to-date, but also help keep their website fresh with content, improving search engine ratings. An article posted by Trevor Cook (as PDF) outlines the benefits of "corporate" blogging. These benefits apply equally to small businesses here in SLO.Blogging builds more productive customer relationships because "people are far more likely to give great feedback if they know someone specific is listening". The power of these feedback loops can generate big benefits: "Customers get listened to more effectively, product teams build better products and support them better. Influentials and evangelists get more information they can use to talk about the products with authority. Everyone wins." With Corporate-Speak in danger of clogging business relationships, the blog could help companies open up the channels. (PDF) SLO AccessibilitySunday, October 10, 2004We've all heard the news about Jarek Molski, a disabled man who filed more than 250 lawsuits against local businesses in California, claiming that eateries along the coast are violating disabled-access laws. With all due respect, let's hope he's not blind too. Elliott Spitzer, Attorney General for the State of New York, recently announced a settlement where Ramada.com and Priceline.com have agreed to make their websites accessible to the blind. The Attorney General opined that the Americans With Disabilities Act requires that private web sites be accessible to blind and visually impaired Internet users. The ADA generally dictates that all "places of public accommodation" and all "goods, services, facilities, privileges, advantages, or accommodations" of places of public accommodation, must be made accessible to disabled citizens, absent undue hardship. New York law provides similar civil rights protections.We expect this settlement will not only lead to greater awareness for the need for accessible websites, but to increased lawsuits, with the ultimate result being the amendment of the ADA to include websites under the umbrella of public accommodations. At that point, it will be become more expensive for businesses to try to achieve compliance as they'll be facing increased penalties. Businesses who launch new websites subsequent to this ruling will likely be targets for lawsuits given that precedent has been set. Ensuring WCAG compliance prior to launch will not only save money, but will reduce legal bills. Web developers who understand Section 508 (which applies to Federal government websites, but is often voluntarily adopted by state and local government agencies) or WCAG (even as it evolves) will be in a strong position to assist clients making the transition to accessible websites. Spitzer Agreement to make Web Sites accessible to the Blind and Visually Impaired. ADA Suits Close Another Beloved Eatery - overlawyered Backing up SLOSaturday, October 09, 2004We're often asked about backup. We suggest no matter what method you use, just make sure you do it! If nothing else, drag and drop files to an external hard disk. Preferably, automate the process so its not left to discipline. Ironically, I spent years developing backup and storage management software, and don't always follow this advice myself.Much like we do in separating content from presentation, we like to keep our data files and program files on separate drives (partitions). Backing up data is then as easy as copying the folders on our data drive to our external hard drive on a regular basis. However, backup programs go a step further and backup everything including the Windows Registry (where program configuration information is stored) and automate the process, making it easier to restore your computer back to the exact state it was in when you last backed up (probably hours ago). Here's a recent article outlining a simple and automated method. PC Backup Is a Must Now - wsj personal tech Respect for SLO DialersFriday, October 08, 2004As hard as it is for our clients to believe, until last week SLO Pages did all its web development from a dial-up connection - over old phone lines maxing out at 26kps. Located in rural San Luis Obispo County, deep in a canyon, DSL, Cable and Wireless simply aren't available. But we do have a view of the southern sky, so last week we did it - we got connected via Satellite. What a difference!We were reluctant to give up dial-up mostly out of respect for those many website visitors still surfing SLOw. At SLO Pages, we have made it a point to design and implement websites that are not only accessible to those with certain physical disabilities - via use of web standards - but to those with a connection handicap - dial-up. We've become masters in sending less data with less round trips to the server. Now that we're on satellite, we promise to remain thoughful of our SLOw patrons. Here's a three-part series that outlines many of the common sense approaches we've already been taking. Cost-Effective Website Acceleration - sitepoint Spamless in San LuisThursday, October 07, 2004Here's a post explaining how to insure your email address stays free of spam. BTW, at SLO Pages we provide our clients with contact forms and javascript cleverness instead of using "mailto" hyperlinks which get picked up by the spambots. But according to the article below, the only way to really prevent spam is to never give out your email address :-). Also included a link to our javascript cleverness method.The Most Exclusive Email Address - Outer Life Avoiding Email-Link Spam SLO CouponsWednesday, October 06, 2004The Passport to the Best of the Central Coast and the Visual Guide to California's Central Coast have joined forces. Currently in a trial run, clients of VirtualSLO.com and SLO County Passport can co-brand with both companies, with cross-over features designed to give the viewer of that advertisement a more interactive and informative visual tool.Contact VirtualSLO.com or SLO County Passport for more information. SLO WinesTuesday, October 05, 2004While currently working on websites for both a Winery and a Wine Store, I found this post at peterme.com very timely. He contemplates a new classification of wines to serve a wider audience. I'll pass this along to my clients.The Information Architecture of Wine Reinventing retail wine sales SLO Public W-Fi?Monday, October 04, 2004Good article on the debate about whether cities should be able to provide public-access Wi-Fi (perhaps at the expense of private broadband providers). Encinitas found a way to provide service to residents through its downtown association.The debate over whether cities should build Wi-Fi networks is hot enough to make the opinion page of a smaller metropolitan area's newspaper New Web Cam in Pismo BeachSaturday, October 02, 2004Added link to new web cam at Pismo Coast Village RV Park. Also added link to their new virutal tour at VirtualSLO.com on the Lodging page.San Luis Obispo Web Cams Exploring SLO with Internet ExplorerFriday, October 01, 2004It's becoming increasingly difficult to write web standard markup with Internet Explorer falling behind its competitors in compatibility. Here's an article that talks about what Microsoft is up to and perhaps why IE hasn't had any significant updates for a couple years.IE--embraced, extended, extinct? Despite all appearances, Microsoft insists it hasn't lost interest in Web browsers. Read More
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