Kara's 101 Creations

This past week I setup a web site for a new client. Kara's 101 Creations, LLC is a hair salon in Van Dyne, Wisconsin. In addition to the full service hair salon, Kara also offers greeting cards, scrap books, and hand-made creations. Kara's does high quality work, as you can see by the sample photo here. Special orders are welcome. Contact Kara at www.karas101creations.com for more information.

On Memorial Day weekend I was at my parents cabin in northeastern Wisconsin. The weather was warm and dry, which is unusual for Memorial Day. As the years go by and the value of the land increases, so does the sentimental value of the property. It's only 5 acres of pine and scrub oak, adjacent to a gravel road, with lots on 3 sides, but it has been our family's primary vacation destination for almost 40 years. I try not too get attached to things like that, but you have to try and appreciate each visit up there, because you never know what the future will bring.

Hulu Rockumentary

Hulu recently added two rock documentaries to their list of full length movies. The one shown here is "Mayor of the Sunset Strip" featuring a biography on the life of Rodney Bingenheimer. I had never heard of him, but he was quite famous in the LA rock scene of the 70's and 80's. The movie is not rated, so be forewarned, it does have some language and brief nudity. Otherwise, if you are interested in rock music of that era, you will find the story of this inside view of the rock music scene fascinating.

Another rockumentary that I found on Hulu is called "Live Forever". This movie documents some of the pop/rock music that was being created during the 90's in Great Britain. The rivalry between "Oasis" and "Blur" makes the movie worth watching. Looking back years later on how a country's political climate influences popular music is also interesting to note. Again, this movie is not rated and has a bit of language, but well worth the watch for anyone who is a fan of rock music.

Webinar Viewer

It's been a while since I made an update about my experiences with online web seminars. Over the last 8 months I've hosted over fifty Internet broadcasts. And because the presentations are live, there are always unexpected challenges to overcome. Since I've had to deal with numerous customer service issues over that time, my knowledge of Citrix's GotoWebinar product has become quite extensive. I'd like to share my thoughts on the product, after having used it for this long. First of all, Citrix doesn't update their products very often, has weak customer support, and does little to keep their customers informed about the status of their systems. But I must admit, their software is well tested and runs without trouble on most computer systems.

As of this writing, GotoWebinar allows you to share application views running on your computer, along with a live audio narration. You can also have poll questions, chat, text questions, and manage everyone's microphone during a session. The biggest complaint I hear is that attendees wish they could see the speaker. Well, I have just created a viewer that will allow a speaker to share a web cam picture and a PowerPoint image using GotoWebinar. I have also found a way to broadcast recorded audio and video using GotoWebinar. Now the system isn't designed to handle this, and it's a lot like trying to force a cat to walk on a leash, but it does add some badly needed functionality to what is basically a general purpose web broadcasting tool. Eventually GotoWebinar will integrate webcam views, but for now, my webinar viewer is the only way to get live video on GtW.