I have a problem.  I have too much software.  I’m not talking about downloading too many freeware or shareware programs from download.com.  I’m talking about old boxes of software taking up too much space in my house.  Over the last 15 years or so I’ve collect a lot of software.  And I am a pack rat.

That’s a dangerous combination, it is resulted in a collection of many boxes of old software that I can’t use of a wanted to.  I’ve gotten many tab for Windows 95, and Visual Basic for Windows 98.  I’ll have a machine though run either of those programs, and I don’t even have a disk drive that will take the discs that came with it.  (I do have an old Acer laptop that runs on beta a version of Windows 95, but it’s 16 MB of RAM just won’t cut it for the program)

Now I’m a light shade of green myself, and this trait combined with my packrat-ism prevents me from throwing the box is a software in the garbage.  I also find eBay to be a bit of a pain in the neck and no one that attends my garage sales are interested in the old software either.

I’d like to recycle all that garbage but there’s nowhere to put it.  So probably end up having to bury it in a landfill, and my grandchildren’s grandchildren will probably have to figure out a way to save the planet from my excesses.  It’s unfortunate that when I bought that software could purchase some sort of software Funeral Insurance, something to take the software and the moral obligation off my shoulders.

Some things just weren’t meant to be . . .

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Sometimes Dragon NaturallySpeaking works so well that you become overconfidence capabilities.  I get a ton of use of this product now, however on occasion the program seems to take a nap or maybe a daydream is a better descriptor.

Sometimes I think the program does live up to its claims of 99% accuracy.  However there seems to be a few circumstances where it falls far short of this claim.

1. If you hibernate a PC or don’t shut down and restart on a regular basis, over time the program will definitely become less accurate.  I’m sure this has a lot to do with RAM utilization and number of other aspects, but as a user that doesn’t matter to me all I know is that the program stops working as well as it used to work.  This is problematic because you build up trust in the program and expect it to work, and when it starts to make substitutions for words you don’t catch it is easily as you might have if you didn’t trust the program.
2. Another problem occurs when you run it with many other programs that are RAM hogs.  You get the same result of slow down performance, and the same problem of potentially not catching a mistake as your expectations have risen.
3. Another problem is that on occasion when you start to speak after you haven’t use the tool for a few minutes or after you’ve just turned on the microphone, there is sometimes a delay.  Now the weird part is that DeLay sometimes results in the words actually been transcribed, only say 40-60 seconds after the fact, and sometimes it doesn’t transcribe it all.  So when you first start talking you need to make sure that the transcription has started with you and that the program is actually ready to write.  You turn the program on and it’s almost like you have to ask your computer, “Are you really paying attention to me?”
4. you also have to be very careful in two circumstances that seem to come up with often enough for me to note them.  One of those is the situation where you’re composing an e-mail, and a strange noise in the background (my dog barking at home for example) apparently sounds to the computer just like the command to send an e-mail.  This results in the unfortunate sending of e-mail before it’s really ready to go.  Another problem that occurs, happens during the use of several different WYSIWYG HTML editors (DNS nine actually got those last three words correct on the first try!).  In some HTML editors something goes a little screwy with DNS nine sometimes.  What I’m trying to write text with the transcription program it sometimes rates it and it HTML portion without the appropriate tags and sometimes it doesn’t.  I see this happen on a regular basis in Windows live writer and on an occasional basis in Macromedia’s Dreamweaver. 
5. Finally DNS nine also sometimes forgets to make the appropriate distinction between simple words like ‘in’ and ‘and’ making what appears to be random substitutions of those words throughout a given discourse.  This is definitely problematic and not something that pops up on spellcheck, and due to the nature of some training that I’ve received in speed-reading I don’t always catch it when I approve the document.  It’s important to note all of these issues and try and remain cognizant of them so that you don’t develop and overconfidence in the software.

At the end of the day it’s a great tool and say the significant amount of time.  You have to be wary of becoming overconfident, picture that guy in the cheesy Viagra commercials who has just received a new boost of confidence.  You need to be aware of these limitations such that you can look out for them and avoid them.  If you can maintain that the tool will definitely increase your productivity and improve your computing experience.

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Two ways to transcribe with Dragon NaturallySpeaking

1. Open, Dragon NaturallySpeaking and load your user profile. You can then hit the transcribing button in the ‘dragon bar.’ This will pop open a dialogue from which you can then select individual files to transcribe. In the individual file transcription you have the option of transcribing to the DragonPad, a WordPad like program that comes with dragon or selecting a destination program such as Word. There’s one distinct advantage that I can identify and using the manual transcription versus the batch, and that is you can playback sound recording at the same time you are looking at the document.
2. Second, use the batch transcription job.
   1. To utilize this function, you need to have the ‘Auto Transcribe Folder Agent’ loaded into your toolbar or select it from: All Programs>Dragon Naturally Speaking Preferred 9 >Dragon Naturally Speaking Tools>Auto Transcribe Folder Agent.
   2. Setup Requirements: You will need to set up folders that will be the the source of transcription wave files and folders for the destination of those wave files. When the program is loaded in the task bar system tray, you copy a wave file to one of those folders and it will automatically start to transcribe, sending those files transcribed into the destination folders.
   3. The transcription process will not run when DNS9 is already open on the DragonBar with microphone on (close program or turn microphone off).
   4. Benefits of batch transcription - It transcribes multiple files that you’ve previously recorded, while you do something else.
   5. Negatives of batch transcription - It transcribes to a notepad file ‘.txt format or a text file that is. So far been my experience that you can not listen back to the wave file that corresponds with the text that was translated as an automated function but you can listen to it independently in any audio program that plays Wav.

Problems with Transcriptions

Accuracy of transcription is not as good as transcription of the live program. This is largely due to the recording devices. You can expect a degredation of at least 2-3% in accuracy for a good device and maybe more for an average to poor device. If you can use a device with a noise cancellation microphone it will help!

How to Play back the sound from a transcription?

• While you are in a Word document that has a transcription,
• highlight a selection of text and hit the play button on the DragonBar
• you can then listen to the actual wave file that corresponds with the text that was generated from a transcription.
• I have not found a way that you can do this after with the .txt files created from a batch transcription(see number 2 below).

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Another company has launched a blog marketing 2.0 service.  SponsoredReview officially launched today.  Many people are expecting some good things from this company as they are partnered with SEOMOZ.org (the same group that brings you the concept of page strength).

I’ve been waiting for the launch of this company so that I could test their services both as a blogger and as an advertiser.  I did not participate in their beta program - no invite 

Blogger Setup

Regardless my first impressions upon signing up as a blogger were positive.  They do offer a requirement that is probably the most strenuous I’ve seen in this category today.  They require a three to one ratio of nonsponsored articles to sponsored articles for a blog to be approved.  That means for every four articles in a blog three of them have to be unpaid without any sponsorship whatsoever.  I suspect that does not include articles with affiliate links, however its not specified.

The only other existing service that comes close to that type of requirement is blogitive, which requires a two to one ratio.  However blogitive’s ratio is not for paid to unpaid, but instead to one non-blogitive articles to blogitive articles.  So for every three articles a person might have is blogitive only one of them can be a blogger to sponsored article.

Otherwise the setup process was relatively easy with sponsored review.  Depending on the strength of your blog your blog will be categorized into different potential price ranges which you can manually increase or decrease.  This is very similar to the new process offered at Reviewme.  Sponsored review does perform a manual check of the blogs apply, and so it will take some time before blog is actually available in the marketplace to pick up reviews. 

Disclosure is required, however I have not yet seen the disclosure requirements in detail meaning I don’t know what you have to say or how you have to say it.

Advertising Setup

I set up an advertising account.  Similar to all the other services appears to do not have a blogger account and an advertiser account in the same setup.  No one that I’ve seen to date in offers a combination account which is unfortunate.

For an advertiser’s perspective the setup was relatively easy.  I establish my first opportunity and that was relatively easy as well.  However there are a number of aspects about the opportunity area that are undefined.  For example I attempted to put in several requirements, however I was not sure to what extent I might be a will to set or establish requirements.  For example I did not know if I could limit page rank, or if I could limit blogs to for example exclude my space blog’s, or if I needed to exclude blogs that included no follow links within the body of a article.  There are no FAQ’s yet in the FAQ section refers you to their blog, with a link to an actual article as opposed to the generic blog such that you have to cut a chunk of code out of the URL to get to the actual front page of the blog.

After I finally created my opportunity hoping for a little bit of luck in getting the opportunity to set up correctly, I realize that there was no way for me to actually fund the opportunity.  This was unfortunate as they were offering $100 incentive for first-time advertisers that spent $100.  I wanted to spend $100 and I wanted to qualify however their system did not allow me to do that.  There is no place I could find or I could actually pay my hundred dollars even though I had set up a credit card.  This was a little confusing. 

So I went to the blog I left a comment underneath the section where it talks about the hundred dollar incentive.  Then after the fact I found a ticket section where I could submit a  Help ticket, which I submitted to sales.

As I was trying to navigate back and forth between the blog and the help ticket and the FAQs page, the system kept getting confused about which user I was.  He couldn’t quite seem to be a wiki but if I were a blogger or if I were an advertiser and I can never tell when I was truly “logged into the system” versus looking at the generic website.

In addition to contact us tab doesn’t actually lead to a phone number or e-mail or any other way to contact them so that couldn’t get a simple question answered such as “How do I pay you?” 

This problem immediately reminded me of PayPerPost.  PayPerPost is notoriously difficult to get in touch with and you may get something fixed or solved in a hurry.  Obviously, sponsored review is still in their initial launch is the first day, however it has been my first can experience at a company that actually provides a phone number allows you to contact them is typically going to be easier to deal with than a company that does not.

As I finish this review its been approximately 30 minutes since I submitted my help ticket request.  And I suspect some other more fortunate advertiser has already claimed the hundred dollar prize or incentive that is.  So the potential for goodwill from that incentive is a bit lost now.  I do hope they work through some of these kinks.

As I’ve been working in the center strain now for close to nine months I’ve seen these types of issues pop up with many of the companies in the same industry competitors of sponsored review and I’ve seen just how these same problems can at times make or break a company to the extent that it will attract or permanently scare away a new advertising customers.

Initial Review During Launch - Incomplete

For a fledgling industries such as Buzz marketing or Internet marketing 2.0, it’s essential that a solid first impression is made.  In this regards sponsored review doesn’t quite come away with the and A, at this point they look promising it might be worthy of a B, however I’ll have to reserve that grade and currently give them an Incomplete.

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In an age where content is king and fresh content is quean, TV networks appear to be learning a lesson from internet business models.

In the online world many content producers writers and publishers often times rework the same concept topic or article over and over and over again with a fresh spin, writing and re-writing a topic several times. Writers will then appear on TV shows as talking heads to spin up their spin articles.

It’s very common for a writer to write an article for newspaper and then have that same article editorialized in the magazine and later spun into a book. Then to push the book they make the rounds on the talk show and news circuit.

Now TV is taking this concept of spinning the same idea over and over again into something called the “Newpeat” (New + Repeat ergo what’s old is new). The NewPeat is not a TV show that is re-run. Instead it’s a TV show that is remixed slightly to become new content again.

NBC is kicking this off with shows that would have been reruns of the hit show the office. They are taking half hour episodes of the office and re-editing them. Then they put in footage that’s never been aired to come up with a new storyline. NBC will then broadcast these NewPeats to audiences that saw the originals and are looking for someone fresh content.

The challenge that networks are facing are three fold.

1. Many of the TV shows on air today do not fare well as reruns. They have audience drop off rates of 40%. Compare that to Seinfeld several years ago that experience drop-off rates of 10%.

The new Pete has the potential to keep that audience present as they offer a new twist on show.

The concept is not entirely new to TV. Over the years many ‘best of’ shows remixed rerun highlights as flashbacks for character and a number of other things. The difference here is that they’re editing in previously unseen footage that was shot for these shows.

Challenge for Artists and Screen Actors Guild

The concept of a new Pete is likely to create some difficulties or challenges possibly even some legal challenges as actors and producers in the networks fight over just compensation for a individual shows. Typically the stars of a television show will for each show, as opposed to being paid for the hours spent filming an episode. So what happens when a one episodes worth of filming gets turned into two or three or four episodes? Do the actors get paid for the original episodes or do they get paid a the episode rate for the remixed show or some other formula?

2. The second dynamic involved in the situation is the Internet. Many television shows are showing up online in minutes after they are originally broadcast. People no longer have to wait for reruns to rerun

3. People have hundreds of other unique viewing options on any given night.

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