I’m my own supervisor. Sadly, as a boss, I suck. In addition, I’m a writer. The very nature of my work encourages idle flights of fancy. As my own overseer, I’m always prone to give me slack.
This bodes badly for my business. I am expected to deliver a certain amount of work by a certain date. Artistic sensibilities aside, the bottom line is if I don’t do the work, I’ve only myself to blame. Lately, I’ve allowed myself to develop bad patterns when fulfilling my obligations. I’ve gotten terribly lazy and it’s time to stop.
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"A lot of adult webmasters are like me. They work solo. They have only their force of will to depend upon." |
My problem is I’m all alone with my work. I’ve got no boss snooping over my shoulder. I’m single so there’s no spouse to bug me about my duties. My folks are dead so they’re no help. My cats are always trying to tell me something but I think their mewlings have nothing to do with whether or not I’ve written my articles for the week. It’s all on me and I’m a bum. I need help. I need a nag.
A lot of adult webmasters are like me. They work solo. They have only their force of will to depend upon. They work from home and have a hard time with charging up that personal drive. It would be nice to be able to hire a personal assistant or secretary but that’s not the most practical option for folks in our business. I’d love to have someone come to my house and tell me to do stuff but I’m not the richest porn monger on the block. I need a financially conservative solution.
And then it hit me. Technology!
We live in magnificent times. We live in an age where it’s possible to telecommute. We have arrived at the age of a world without borders. The planet is our market and anyone can run an International business from the privacy of his or her den. We deal with customers, vendors, sponsors and contractors whom we may never meet. All because of technology. That’s why it occurred to me that if technology got me into this business, then technology could get me out of my funk.
I know what some of you might be thinking right about now. "Oh god. She’s gonna tell us to use freaking Microsoft Outlook!"
If this were five years ago I would. Don’t misunderstand. Microsoft Outlook is a hell of a program. Not only is it email software, it’s also a personal manager. Outlook allows you to do cool stuff like catalog important information about folks on your contact list. You can set up personal reminder alarms in Outlook. You can create a daily, weekly or monthly schedule.
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With Outlook you can manage your day, your tasks and your contacts and you can run it all seamlessly with Access and Excel. It’s great software but it takes a lot of time to learn and configure. That kind of effort does nothing for the inherently lazy like me. Besides, Outlook is the biggest hacker magnet on the planet. It’s also a resource hog. If I ran an office or controlled a network, then Outlook would be a viable solution. But I don’t. I need a simple solution for my common malady.
Fortunately for me and those of you like me, I’ve found some sweet solutions to the sloth dilemma:
IPING
(http://www.iping.com)
You might be familiar with email reminder services. Those are great when you happen to be online. But what if you're trying to correct your off-line behavior? What if you could find a service that would actually call your phone and tell you what you need to hear? IPING is such a service. Need to get out of bed? Need reminders about that overdue project? IPING will call your phone and leave you a prerecorded message or even recite your personalized message with text-to-speech technology.
MyCalls
(http://www.mycalls.net)
This service is like IPING except it offers a flat rate, which includes a snooze feature. Snoozes come in really handy if you sleep through alarm clocks like I do. The way it works is the service calls you at a scheduled time. If you want to snooze for a while, all you have to do is tap any number besides #1 on the keypad. MyCalls will then call you back with a snooze call. You get one wake up call and up to three snoozes per day for only $9.99!
Corkboard
(http://www.mycorkboard.com)
This could quite possibly be the most functional screensaver ever invented. This freeware program does it all. It lets you make check lists, set audible alarms, time monitor breaks and even tack little virtual notes right on your computer screen! The whole thing works in an environment that looks just like the memo board you would hang in your office. You have to sign up to keep the software but it's worth it!
I’d love to be one of those organized and disciplined people. But I’m not. I absolutely love what I do but I’m certainly no workaholic. I need help. I need a nag. If I can’t live with one, if I can’t hire one, then by god I’ll download one!