Top 10 Ways to Fire the Client From Hell

Sometimes clients are more trouble that they are worth, and all that there is left to do is fire them:

"Clients are the lifeblood of any business. Without them, your venture simply doesn't exist. On the other hand, some clients are so bad that your business, not to mention your personal sanity, is better off without them. So what do you do when you have a client that pushes you to the brink? You fire them! Here's how to give 10 of the worst offenders the pink slip without burning bridges."

This is all golden advice if you want to remain happy and profitable.

Do You Recognize These 10 Mental Blocks to Creative Thinking?

"Whether you’re trying to solve a tough problem, start a business, get attention for that business or write an interesting article, creative thinking is crucial. The process boils down to changing your perspective and seeing things differently than you currently do.

People like to call this “thinking outside of the box,” which is the wrong way to look at it. Just like Neo needed to understand that “there is no spoon” in the film The Matrix, you need to realize “there is no box” to step outside of. "

by Brian Clark on 10 Mental Blocks to Creative Thinking.

P.S. There is no spoon.

Psychelfyn Mixes

Chelfyn is currently in the studio cooking up some new tunes and mastering an upcoming album release from Baxter Godfrey (AKA DJ Baxter).

Baxter has been away from the scene for a couple of years writing his own music. He's going to be back in a big way in 2008 with his debut album coming our on TMet Recordings soon. Watch this space!

In the meantime catch some Kiwi summer vibes with three Psychelfyn Psytrance mixes:

http://mohawkmedia.co.nz/mp3/psychelfyn_1_astral_raveling.mp3

http://mohawkmedia.co.nz/mp3/psychelfyn_2_show_dont_tell.mp3

http://mohawkmedia.co.nz/mp3/psychelfyn_3_dream_it_up.mp3

Enjoy!

I am a reddit addict

I have been a big reddit fan since the social news site first began. That little alien sure know his news, as does the active reddit community of fact checkers. No spurious Fox style media propaganda makes it past these gatekeepers, and never underestimate the need of a geek to correct. The comments sections are often lively, full of interesting trivia, and they will have the facts back on a story in minutes.

It's a matter of geek pride and an overwhelming compulsion to correct which I also share. Must ...not... let GIGO take over the world! If you dig deeper than the home page you can find all manner of interesting sub-reddits by topic. My very first page of the day with my morning tea is always science.reddit.com. Which gives me hope each day for the future of humanity and our planet.

I'm also partial to a bit of business.reddit.com and entertainment.reddit.com for news other than Britney's latest crotch flash. We've all seen it. Now put it away like a good girl. I'm now in the beta testing group for the upcoming release of My Reddit and am loving the new sub-groups.

I've added Cognitive Science, Transhuman and Comics to my favourites. Now as I told the reddit crew the alien needs to take some time off to meet a reddit girl, as even Pac Man found love eventually.

Creative Business Tips at Twitter

You can now read MsBehaviour's CreativeBizNZ tweets with tips, tools and advice on running a creative business at Twitter: twitter.com/creativebiznz

One in Four Would Take Paycut to Work at Home

A recent survey has revealed that almost one in four employees (22 per cent) would be prepared to take a pay cut to work from home. Six per cent would be prepared to take a reduction in pay of between six and 10 per cent and two per would be prepared to take a pay cut of between 16 and 20 per cent. (Thanks to Personnel Today.)

33 HR Tips from Futurama & Planet Express

While you might not actually work with a rag-tag group of aliens, robots and incompetent but well meaning former pizza delivery boys, sometimes you feel like you might as well be. Turns out that in the future, managing employees hasn’t really gotten any easier, but you can take away a few lessons on what works-and what doesn’t-from Futurama with these Planet Express HR Tips.

Top 10 Lies told to Naive Artists and Designers

Top 10 Lies told to Naive Artists and Designers is something every creative kid should be taught school. Includes the gems:

"Do this one cheap (or free) and we'll make it up on the next one."

No I tell you what - you pay me full price and if we're both happy I may give you a discount on the next one.

"Well, the job isn't CANCELLED, just delayed. Keep the account open and we'll continue in a month or two."

I don't lend my friends money - why should I lend it to you?

"Contract? We don't need no stinking contact! Aren't we friends?"

I'm not in business to make friends I'm in business to make money and a contract assures me you will pay. If you are unhappy at signing a contact then in my experience, you're probably not planning on paying me.

Be strong and treat your business like a business by being as professional as you can, but always be prepared to say no. It is better to walk away from a bad client than spend time on a job you may never get paid for. Above all never deliver work that has not been paid for in full, and always place in your terms and conditions that all digital assets remain your property until the account is cleared.

Again if they don't like your terms then walk away! Life is too short to do business with a**holes.

Online Productivity God: 400+ Tools

400+ Resources To Make You Smarter, Faster & a Demon in the Sack Resources To Make You Smarter, Faster & a Demon in the Sack

Miss Aspielicious Tweets

Miss Aspielicious is a lovingly compiled collection of tweets on Aspie websites, resources, personal first hand observations and links about Asperger's syndrome, living on the spectrum and being an aspie girl. She has mentioned two of my posts, *Blush*, and is Aspielicious enough for me to add her Twitter feed to my blog.

The Fantabulous World of Dr Grordbort

In my first MsBehaviour File this year I interview the brilliant Dr Grordbort, also known as Greg Broadmore, self professed comics nerd and Conceptual Designer for Wellington's Weta Workshop.

He is currently creating a Steampunk Universe with Rayguns, Robots and the beautiful but deadly Moon Mistress. A world of Venusian Princesses and giant buffoons in robotic suits.

Read The Fantabulous World of Dr Grordbort at the Big Idea, or listen to advice from Dr Grordbort [1:40]

Watch a contrapulatronic commercial for Dr Grordbort's Infallible Aether Oscillators!



Catch a LIVE interview with the creator of Lord Cockswain on The MsBehaviour Files for Radio Wammo on Kiwi FM, Wednesday 30th January at 4.10 p.m. in New Zealand.

The History of Geek

The delightful Marina from hot for words explains the origins of the word Geek. Pay attention as we will be asking questions later...



See also WIRED's Sexy Geek selection of L33t Cybergirlz.

Candy Phloss Pops Her Weather Cherry

Miss Candy Phloss is the newest angel on the Weather Angels network. Warning! Contains nipples.

Sexed Up Bees are Better Dancers

Honeybee queens that have sex with harems of males, give birth to much better dancers, research reveals. It also shows that the more genetically diverse the hives are, the harder the boy bees like to wiggle for their Queen and Mistresses:

"What really surprised us was the extent of difference," researcher Heather Mattila, a honeybee behaviorist at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y., told LiveScience.

"In some colonies, you can see the less genetically diverse bees pretty much just standing still on the honeycombs on the videotape, while bees in the genetically diverse colonies are dancing or have left to go forage."

The dance of a bee has been found to be a form of code that I shall call BinaBee from now on.

I'm Bitextual

Cyanide & Happiness @ Explosm.net

Flow and Only Ooze the Shadow

I love finding examples of Engrish and was delighted to discover these gems on makeup at the local $2 store. First we have 'Gakeve Eyeshadow' which invites you to 'Flow and Only Ooze the Shadow!' The colours are super bright as described on the packet beautifully:

"Perfect to appear ourstanding colour is excellent to prolong malleability, result lasting, how heavily does it colour, can create repeatedly and steroscopic eyes the result."

Wow. I've always wanted steroscopic eyes like the bionic woman.

Next we have some Mascara that I am not to brave enough to put on my lashes (even if it was probably made in the same factory as the real thing), but the Engrish and Flench translations on the packaging were worth the purchase alone. After all you get the following delights:

'watertightness and length' with a special 'bual headed brush' which will not 'adhibit or agglomerate '. This wondrous item promises that with the 'magic power of waterproof and non-discolouring, the product can nurse your eye lash all the time.'

Fantastic. Now I'm imaging magic elves cosseting my lashes all night.

Happy New Year

What a lovely lazy start to the year. The only problem I have right now is where to hang my hammock....