Jay Selthofner, attending a Free Fishing Weekend event in Green Lake, Wisconsin, which he organized. Photo provided by the DNR.

In the interest of full disclosure, I would like to state up front that I am the volunteer webmaster for Friends of Jay Selthofner and I am in the process of creating a website for him. However, no one asked me to write this, I am not being compensated for it in any way, and it is solely my personal opinion as a citizen who is concerned about the state of the economy, our environment, and the many other urgent issues facing us today.  (I didn’t start a company called “Green Web Design” for no reason! I have spent a lot of time learning about what Jay thinks on the issues that are most important to me in the past few weeks, and I really believe that his plans and ideas will work.  He’s a really nice guy who cares about his community. Vote for Jay Selthofner for Wisconsin State Assembly in November!

Original Wisconsin Marihuana Tax Stamp from Markesan, Wisconsin offers a glimpse of our state's history, and possible future! Jay's campaign slogan is "Let's Get Growing".

Jay’s proposal to legalize Industrial hemp in Wisconsin once again would not only create many different types of jobs and generate revenue for our state, it would also help the environment in the process at no additional cost, making things cleaner and safer for ourselves and for future generations.

Industrial Hemp Farmer and John Deere Tractor

• Industrial Hemp can yield 3-8 dry tons of fiber per acre. This is four times what an average forest can yield.
• Industrial Hemp can displace cotton –  50% of all the world’s pesticides are sprayed on cotton.
• Industrial Hemp can displace wood fiber and save forests for watershed, wildlife habitat, recreation and oxygen production, carbon sequestration (reduces global warming), and other values.

bird covered in oil

With the BP oil spill and other environmental disasters that are going on all over the world at the moment, now more than ever I hope that people will realize we can’t go on using endless natural resources and wantonly polluting forever as though there are no consequences.  We are killing ourselves, and our world economy is in shambles. How much do you think  this oil spill going to cost us to clean up when it’s all said and done? At what cost to the environment? How many lives changed by health problems as a result of the cleanup efforts and how much of the fishing industry harmed?  If you’re not alarmed, you’re not paying attention. Want to know what you can do to help in Wisconsin?  For starters, vote for Jay Selthofner for Wisconsin State Assembly in District 41, and vote for Industrial Hemp in Wisconsin. We can  create biofuel from Industrial Hemp, as well as many diverse and beneficial products including textiles, medicines, and foods.

oil spill cleanup

No amount of money can buy clean water, air, and soil if there is none left anywhere in the world.  It’s only going to cost us more in the long run if we destroy the scarce natural resources contained in this tiny planet that we all must live on, while foolishly refusing to use cleaner, better resources whenever they are available to us.  We must develop cheaper, safer technologies for the future. Industrial Hemp can be a valuable asset, as it was for over 12,000 years around the world. Hemp can actually clean up toxins from the ground. This process is called phytoremediation. A good example of this is when hemp was used to help clean up the Chernobyl nuclear disaster site to remove radioactive elements from the ground. Why couldn’t we use it to try and help clean up the oil spill? If we have to wait months for a fix that works anyways, why not get growing now so we have one more option to help clean up this disaster!

What will we do when every last inch of the land, air, and sea has been polluted?

The bottom line is that we need to work towards boosting the economy and trying to save our global water supply from massive scale pollution. We also need to spend our tax dollars to fight violent drug cartels and other ACTUAL criminals, rather than farmers, cancer and other types of sick or dying patients, as well as decent, taxpaying citizens who aren’t hurting anyone, even themselves.

Putting patients and other responsible, law-abiding taxpayers in prison is not the answer. Our current laws are cruel and unusual.

Rather than bailing out the mega corporations that cumulatively contributed towards the whole sorry mess to begin with, we need to bail out our farmers, as well as patients and citizens who need jobs. We need to introduce and vote on compassionate laws which heal our economy and our environment while respecting human rights. The penalties for breaking a law should never be more harmful than the crime. Especially when it’s an unjust law to begin with. Refusing to hear any of the facts before rushing in with guns blazing is NOT acceptable anymore. We need effect an actual change, one which benefits us all.  We need jobs, we need for our economy to recover, and we need to start working towards a cleaner, safer environment for all. Visit Jay’s website: www.JaySelthofner.com You can also follow him on facebook: http://www.facebook.com/JaySelthofnerForWIStateAssembly *If you click “like” on facebook, you can keep up with his campaign between now and November!

Wisconsin State Assembly District 41

Please come to the polls and vote for Jay if you live in the following areas: Wisconsin District 41 covers parts of Waushara County, Green Lake County, Marquette County, and Fond du Lac County. Cities in District 41 include: Springwater, Saxeville, Bloomfield, Wild Rose, Wautoma, Mount Morris, Leon, Poysippi, Coloma, Richford, Dakota, Marion, Redgranite, Warren, Aurora, Newton, Crystal Lake, Neshkoro, Seneca, St. Marie, Berlin, Mecan, Princeton, Brooklyn, Green Lake, Ripon, Metomen, Alto, Marquette, Kingston, Manchestor, Mackford, Markesan, Fairwater, Brandon, Omro, Fremont, and more!

HoozDooz.com

My buddy Matt in New York is, among other things, a fellow website designer who also owns a classifieds website.  HoozDooz.com is a great resource for those in the garment industry looking to buy, sell, barter, rent, lease, employ, and more.  It’s easy to get signed up, and easy to post ads.  Sign up for a free user account and check it out!

Also, check out what RUEBENMARLEY from  toptenwholesale.com had to say about them:

Hoozdooz.com has been getting a lot of attention lately, even though they are just a budding enterprise. HBO has featured them in a recent documentary called Schmatta: Rags to Riches to Rags, giving perspective on how much the New York Garment District has lost its hold as the leader for American apparel manufacturing. By building a community backing, the company has great potential to make a remarkably large positive impact on the fashion and creative industries.

what are you waiting for?

HoozDooz.com

50StatesClassifieds.com

This post is regarding our free classifieds website, 50 States Classifieds.  We thought it was worth cross-posting, since so many Green Web Design blog readers also use the site.

Some users may not be aware that there is an easier way to reach their ads.  This is just a quick note to let you know about some of the other ways you can find us.

We use these different website addresses when advertising, so that shoppers can easily find local ads in their state without remembering a  long, complicated URL.

For example: Telling people to go to AdvertiseWisconsin.com is so much easier than telling them to go to “http://www.50statesclassifieds.com/category.php?cid=87”   and expecting them to remember it!

50 States Free Classifieds

Use this easy reference list to find our free classifieds site quickly and easily according to which state you’re in:

As those who know AJ are no doubt aware, these past several years have also been rough in other ways. In addition to losing Molly Mae, he has lost several human loved ones, had multiple knee surgeries due to injuries he originally sustained fighting for our country, and has suffered other numerous setbacks that, in my opinion, hardly seem very fair, considering how much of his life he has devoted to volunteering in his community and helping others. Because he is humble and does not like to draw attention to himself, he has largely suffered in silence, not asking for help. Well, as his friend, I’m not too proud to ask for help. Please help me find him a new animal companion to train as his next K9 partner. The lucky dog who goes to live with AJ will be incredibly loved, and will receive extensive training in Search and Rescue, Forensics, and more.

Here is what we need from you, the reader:

A Rough Coat Collie (basically, a lassie dog), pick of the litter, approximately 6mos – 1 year old – the dog must be FREE, as AJ cannot afford to buy a dog at the moment. However, the dog will receive excellent veterinary care, as we do have a veterinarian who generously volunteers their services to AJ / 911BC. AJ has 35 years of experience in SAR – All you will have to do is give AJ 15 minutes with the dog, in person, and he will be able to tell whether it is a suitable candidate for Forensics work. The dog must be healthy, well socialized, and not too afraid of new things, also must not be afraid of climbing, and other awkward activities.

Not only would you be doing a good deed, you would be bringing joy to a man who has selflessly volunteered for his community for decades, asking for nothing in return for his hard work. He does not accept payment for his volunteer work, and has found many missing persons both alive and dead, bringing their families help and closure that they otherwise might not have had, or may have had to wait a long time for otherwise. Please help him now.

Even though he is too shy and proud to ask for help, he does need your help, and yes, I am talking to you, specifically.

Please contact AJ@911bc.org or Jessica@greenwebdesign.com if you have a rough coat collie that you would be willing to give AJ, or if you know someone who has such a dog, and may be willing to help.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Jessica

After you’ve signed up for your Google account, you’ll want to look over in the upper right hand corner.   You’ll see a link that says Settings, which presents you with two more choices when selected:  Search Settings, and Google Account settings.

Click on Search Settings, and you will see  a page which lets you configure how you’d like to search Google.  It’s pretty standard:

• Interface Language / Search Language: Select your language preferences.
• SafeSearch Filtering: If you’re at work you definitely want to keep the SafeSearch filter on!
• Number of Results: I always view 100 results at a time.  It saves me the hassle of clicking next… next… next… endlessly.
• Results Window: You may find it convenient to open results in a new window.  I often do.  And if you don’t like it you can change it back later!
• Query Suggestions: Because my job involves web marketing and data analysis, I opt to keep the suggestions on, as it can be very useful to see what Google thinks are associated with my search terms.
• Search Wiki: this basically lets you give an up arrow to certain pages and domains in search results so that if your domain or page shows up for that search term, it will show up on top of the first page, making it easy to find if you’re doing keyword research or some other marketing research.  However, if you just want to see what comes up naturally, you have to turn it off, as everything you move up to the top will be there for that keyword search in the future, unless you turn it off or move it back down again.

The next thing you’ll want to do is go back to settings in the upper right hand corner, and this time, you’re going to customize your Google Account Settings. Here, you will see numerous options.  I’ll discuss a few of the basics here.

The first thing you should do is click on “Change password recovery options” and make sure that, if you should ever forget your password, you will be able to reset it.

Next, over on the left, click on Edit Profile.  Fill out as much information as you are comfortable with, and select whether your full name should be searchable.  At the bottom, you will find a bio area, as well as a Links area to link to your websites.  (if you’re really cool, you’ll link to GreenWebDesign.com and/or 50StatesClassifieds.com! 

If you have a Picasa, Flickr, or other photo service account, click on the Photos tab to link it to your Google Account.

Back at the main Google Accounts page (which you can always find by going back to http://www.google.com/accounts), scroll down to My Products.

You may already have some products showing here, such as: AdSense, Analytics, Checkout, Google Affiliate Network, Knol, Notebook, Picasa, Sites, Voice, Webmaster Tools, AdWords, Blogger, Docs, Health, Local Business Center, Orkut, Profiles, Subscribed Links, Wave, youTube, Alerts, Calendar, Gmail, iGoogle, Merchant Center, Page Creator, Reader, Talk, and Web History.

If you don’t have any products, you should “Try Something New”, where you can click on things you haven’t signed up for yet.  Try some stuff out and see how it goes!

The rest of this section, you can explore on your own!  Feel free to ask specific questions if you get stuck on something.

Ways to search Google more effectively using custom queries:

When you’re searching for something really specific, try putting quotation marks around it.  For example, “Green Web Design”.

If you’re looking for something and the search results are too broad, try a plus sign!  For example, Green+Web+Design

If you read something on a particular website, but can’t remember how to find it again, try searching just in that domain.  For example, in google, type this into the search box:  site:greenwebdesign.com marketing and you’ll see that you only get results from GreenWebDesign.com which contain the word marketing.

If you’d like to find some pages that are similar to a page, enter this into the search box:

related:http://www.greenwebdesign.com/

Webmasters: If you would like to find out when Google last visited a page on your website, you can do so by entering the following text into the search box at google.com:

cache:http://www.greenwebdesign.com/  OR  cache:http://www.greenwebdesign.com/index.html

There are many other ways you can search using custom search queries, but these will probably be more than enough for most people.

You’ll also find lots of fun Google Goodies at:

http://www.google.com/intl/en/options/

==

Jessica Franke is the owner of Green Web Design, a full service Website Design, Web Hosting, Domain Registrar, and Online Marketing firm.  She is also the owner of 50 States Classifieds, and has been providing Free Classifieds online since 2002.  For more articles written by Jessica Franke, visit her blog.

The best place to start?

I recommend starting your people search by signing in at Facebook.com, Myspace.com, classmates.com, and other popular social networking websites.  Do a search for your relatives, and see if you can find them easily.  If so, offer up a thanks to the Internet and get back in touch.

Unfortunately, it’s not always that easy.

If you find several different pages of results for the name, and one or more doesn’t have a picture, here’s the general idea:

scroll through all of the results and see if the people with pictures are the person you’re seeking.

If not, take a second look at the list, this time looking more closely at those with no pictures, to see if you recognize them in the details – a mutual friend on their friends list, or perhaps you’ll find that they’ve become a fan or friend of the restaurant you used to meet at every tuesday afternoon at 1pm.

If you can’t find this type of helpful information in any of the profiles, and there are only a couple of results that you’re unsure of, it doesn’t hurt to send a quick message to a few of them.

Remember to state any other names (maiden name, married name, siblings, etc) that they might have known you by;  State any other names you knew them by;  thank them for their time, and wait for a reply.

Don’t be offended if you don’t hear back right away – many people only signed up because someone talked them into it initially, and they may not have been back to their profile in ages.

Next, go to Google. com type in their name and see what you come up with.  In most cases, you’ll get gazillions of results, none of them what you wanted.  You just need to know how to ask!

If you go to Google.com and search for john doe, you’ll get way too many results to find the one you’re looking for, in most cases.  Instead, search for “john doe” with quotation marks around it, or or john+doe+chicago with plus signs instead of spaces.  Keep it simple – by using the quotations, you’re telling google to look for that exact phrase, letter for letter, no ifs, ands or buts.  if your search criteria is too strict, and you add quotation marks around it,  you likely won’t get any results at all.  On the other hand, when using + signs, you’re searching for john AND doe in one page, but even if nothing matches exactly, you’ll still see some results.

Remember, even if you can’t find them the first time, that doesn’t mean they’re not out there, or that they won’t be some time in the future.  If you try again every 3-6 weeks, eventually, you may just find them!

If you don’t, why not give Family Heritage Consulting a try?  Ron Kolb is a professional Genealogy Researcher, whose skills can be just as valuable for finding the living!

Above all, Good Luck with your search!

==

Jessica Franke is the owner of Green Web Design, a full service Website Design, Web Hosting, Domain Registrar, and Online Marketing firm.  She is also the owner of 50 States Classifieds, and has been providing Free Classifieds online since 2002.  For more articles written by Jessica Franke, visit her blog.

http://www.dandyid.org

DandyID serves as a single reference point to your Flickr, Twitter, LinkedIn & over 250 other services!

If you’re like me and have at least 100 different social networking profiles, then you *need* this. What it basically does is shows you a huge list of social networking sites. You enter in your user id for each site and it automatically creates a page that links to all of your profiles in one handy spot.

As if that isn’t cool enough, you can then create a widget for your blog, website, etc. that you can use to link to your profiles easily.

There are several different widgets and styles, but this is my favorite:

I noticed that it didn’t have startupnation listed, but I was able to easily and quickly suggest the site to them.

It will probably take me 2 weeks to finish entering all of my different profiles, but with the handy widget that automatically updates (above) I can just enter them once at DandyID – no need to update this, or any other page when I am done!

I’m actually pretty impressed.

In addition to our Free Classifieds services, now members can also create a public profile. A public profile is a great way to list your shipping terms, your physical store location if you have one, or other pertinent information about your business, services, or products.

Register for an account and post a free ad today!

• Myspace
  
• YouTube
  
• StumbleUpon
• Del.icio.us
• Care2
• Digg
• Faves
• LinkedIn
• Squidoo
• Startup Nation
• The Bubbler
• Orkut
  
• Twitter