Kid’s headsets and Ear Safety

There is little public mention of the hearing damage that iPods and portable listening devices can do to our kids. Currently, there is not enough awareness with parents to easily help evaluate these noise levels, and protect their kids from damaging their eardrums.

Three ways to deal with this: 1) Inform parents that it is a concern. 2) Offer alternative devices that will protect their hearing. 3) Learn how to adjust their device, to a maximum volume level.

Here are some products that replace iPod ear buds and will not easily fall out of the ear:

iHearSafe.com

Safe Volume Earbuds and Headphones (less than $30.00)

LoudEnough

Earbuds made by Ultimate Ears that are specifically designed for children in three great colors! (Under $50.00 that includes a carrying case!)

iFrogz.com

Tadpole Headphones – over the ear (less than $15)

GearForKidz.com

Headphones for Kids! (less than $20.00)

Sony

MDR-222KD  Children’s Headphones (Under $20, AND they come in pink)

An alternative to just buying these headphones is to learn the easy way Apple has offered up a setting on their mp3 players.

A website for under $1000?

The problem with web sites are the relative expectations of both the web consultant and the client. These two things can remain out of line for the entire development cycle of the website until the site is launched and then expectations are disappointed. Just the design alone, could be an eventual point of contention.
If the client never looks at websites, but thinks they ‘need a website’, this is akin to buying transportation and grabbing a used single speed bicycle. Was this the initial intention? Simply to go from point A to B? Does the client have luxury 4-door in mind, or is a bike more relevant?
Consultants need to make sure they understand the purpose and significance of the site, and use a questionnaire to review major points of expectations. This is only step two in the website shopping process.  Step one would be to look at the web and find examples of what kinds of site layout they think is best for their business and purpose.
The least discussed aspect to this entire process: a web consultant has no less than five major tools to build websites, and websites cannot be flipped from one tool to another without complications and hidden costs.  Any one of these tools is a commitment to that consultant’s business. Most consultants will not work outside of their particular tool. To know a tool well enough to use it does not make someone a good consultant.  To know it well enough to fix website problems is a different level entirely. Each of these tools have pre-packaged templates. These templates may or may not fall in line with the design expectations of the client. If the template design of all these tools are too simplistic for what the client had in mind, then a designer needs to be called in and this increases the price.
So the desire to ask for the entire package in under $1000 is more complicated than one may think. The only people who will pull this off – and design a site in league with other modern sites – is a shop that does this all day long, and has many sites to prove their success and feature offerings. This is not a realistic price-point as of the writing of this blog post, for most client expectations. Designing websites is as much as task of the work as setting the expectations of their clients.

Replacement Machines…

There are a lot of clients who ask me what is worth purchasing for new machines and replacement machines in their business. Most businesses can expect a machine to fail prematurely due to one of the following situations:

1. Expired or No anti-virus can cause this machine to degrade into a worthless tool.

2. Per to Peer file sharing – line Bearshare and Limewire can cause this slowdown. Also, torrents can cause this slowdown.

3. Wireless networks that do not have a security passphrase or passcode, could allow neighbors to use your network for downloads on a peer to peer network or torrents.

4. Using an old machine that has too many newer programs on it may be the cause of the problem.

Menlotechnical Consulting will always be available for diagnosing which of these relate to your network or machine. Most times, older computers can be upgraded with very little cost compared to an entirely new machine. Remember: a new cheap machine is not always a better machine since companies like Sony, Acer, Toshiba, Lenovo and Dell can sell you a machine with parts that are not hardy enough to run things smoothly. They remove essential components to reduce the price, leaving the buyer unhappy with the performance.