I got a request to review a new Screen Recorder Software called Camtica in exchange for a free copy.
Camtica is touted for anything you would use a desktop capture tool for, plus it touts the ability to capture Skype calls.
It’s lightweight and easy to use, and so far, delivers what it promises.
I’m trying my hand at niche sites, as inspired by Pat Flynn over at smartpassiveincome.com. Currently, I’m developing two sites: a political site as a resource about a major political race and Mail Merge and Word.com, a how to page for mail merge in Microsoft Word.
So far, 2012 Political Info has already made the first page of Google results, and I’ll have updates on Mail Merge and Word here soon.
A guest post by Montana Legislator Mike Miller (@MikeMillerHD84):
Twitter is somewhat similar to Facebook, but not quite the same. Twitter limits you to “tweeting” messages limited to 140 characters – including spaces.
You “follow” people on Twitter and then you can see their “tweets”. People that follow you can see your tweets. You can send direct, private messages that do not appear to your followers.
I currently follow about 100 people – a lot of them are the press like Mike Dennison and Chuck Johnson along with Marnee Banks and Emile Ritter. I also follow the Twitter Feeds of the major newspapers like the Helena IR, The Bozeman Chronicle, the Ravalli Republic, the Billings Gazette, etc. I follow @MontanaGOP and @DennyRehberg. You can follow lots of members of Congress. Twitter will suggest people for you to follow based on the people you do follow. I’ve followed a few of the suggestions and ignore most of them.
I know what is happening around the State generally before the rest of the public knows it. For example, I was able to let Wayne Stahl know that a roof had collapsed on a stadium in his district within about 10 minutes of it happening. He was able to check on it and of course appeared to be in touch with the folks at home even though he was in Helena.
Twitter supports what is called a “hashtag”. The is just the # with whatever you want to put behind it – all tweets with a similar hash tag will appear on a single page.
Currently, the hash tag #MTLeg is for news about the Montana Legislature. A lot of people like the Liberals and the Press use it a lot –conservatives and Republicans are NOT well represented.
To illustrate the power of Twitter – Representative Franke Wilmer’s challenge for Denny’s seat was announced on Twitter. A high percentage of the press across the State saw that and she said within 5 minutes, the Bozeman Chronicle was on the phone to her.
What a GREAT way to get out a press release!
I do not have a “smart phone” (Blackberry, iPhone or Android phones) and I use Twitter exclusively from my laptop. I use a program called TweetDeck that greatly simplifies and enhances features not available through the standard Twitter interface including managing multiple searches and scheduling tweets. I know there are programs for the smart phones and programs that let you tie your Facebook and Twitter together – I do not use any of those.
To sign up, just go to www.twitter.com and click the button sign up. I use MikeMillerHD84 for my account ID and I use the State Legislative picture as my “icon”. Keep in mind, that like on Facebook, anything you say is public.
Representative Mike Miller is a self-employed computer consultant from Helmville, Montana and currently serves in the Montana State Legislature.
