Interesting Stuff | Cheap Bail Holiday

Using eBay Auctions for Fundraising

Everyone is getting on the bandwagon. Large companies successfully use eBay auctions to clear leftover inventory, the Postal Service rids itself of unclaimed merchandise, police departments sell confiscated goods. Thousands of nonprofits are doing business with eBay.

Are eBay auctions the fundraiser’s sugar daddy or are the dangling cash-carrots never quite attainable?

There you have both ends of the online auction spectrum. Likely, your organisation’s ability to generate donations in this fashion lies somewhere in between, hopefully toward the high end. Merely registering an account with eBay doesn’t guarantee that sellers will be prompted to donate part of an item’s selling price to your group. Or that buyers will gobble up your items. Philanthropically minded people are only beginning to see online auctions as a serious avenue of charitable giving.

Successfully trading on eBay is far more than a mechanical process. You’ll need staff and/or volunteer commitment, and sales and marketing know-how. It takes little skill to get on the bandwagon; it takes a lot not to fall off.

There are several main reasons to use eBay as part of your overall fundraising plan. Not because its the cool thing to do. Not because it takes the place of person-to-person campaigning.
But because:
* EBay enables your group to reach a huge, new market of non-constituents, uncultivated strangers who will immediately participate in funding your projects by buying your items.

*You can fit a few hundred people in an in-house auction room, but you can reach millions online.

*You’ll capture new prospects. A percentage of buyers will turn out to be donors to future campaigns if your follow-through is sound. Otherwise, why not simply run an online membership auction from your organisation’s web site?

* It’s cost effective. No space to rent, tickets to sell, caterers to hire, and so on.

* Its novelty will captivate volunteers who are used to performing the same campaign tasks year after year.

How you can capture a profitable share of this new market depends on the sales direction you take, the items you offer, how they’re presented, and your game plan.

Direct and Community Selling
You’ll obviously receive the most income and acquire the most new prospects if your group uses donated items to auction. For nonprofits, eBay terms this “Direct Selling.” It’s the same technique used by organisations that produce in-house, live auctions by soliciting in-kind gifts.

“Community Selling” is a term eBay uses to describe the process whereby sellers designate all or part of the selling price to an organisation. This offers your present donors new opportunities to support your drive.

For example, the Johnson’s annual gift is $100. Your latest newsletter describes and promotes the benefits to the campaign from members selling unwanted items on eBay. The Browns’ decide that two 17″ hand painted platters are items they haven’t used for years. They list them on eBay at $19.95 each and designate your group to receive 80% of the selling price.

The remaining 20%, they figure, will take care of shipping. The platters each sell for $25. You have an additional donation from the Browns of $40. If 99 other present donors did the same you’d have an additional $4,000 on top of their cash gifts. And what about the members who couldn’t afford to give you cash donations? Surely, many of them would find an item or two to sell on eBay on your behalf. So, you see, the potential for raising funds through eBay is real, but eBay is only the vehicle, not the driving force. Selling the concept is the organisation’s job.

What Items to Offer?
While it’s been shown that many non-constituent eBay buyers react favorably to knowing that proceeds of a sale are helping fund a nonprofit organisation, their interest is driven by an item’s appeal, not necessarily an organisation’s mission.

People will buy anything, especially when they think they’re getting a deal. Last time I looked, a set of 10 real shark teeth was about to be auctioned for $7.99. But since you’re in the serious business of raising money, not running online garage sales, offering genuine collectable teeth will do little to help fund your annual budget. Stay away from trinkets when soliciting direct selling items if possible. However, memorabilia is a natural for online auctions.

The more your items play to a universal audience the more they’ll be seen, and the higher the selling price. For example, a vintage Cowboy type belt buckle from a city in Arizona could sell to a local organisation member or be even more valuable to an Australian outback buyer.

Most everything sells on eBay, but collectibles have always been big sellers, also electronics in all categories, music, books and games. Everyone has a few old books and CDs lying around that you can convert to cash by selling them on ebay. And certainly one-time, high profile items with special appeal, like seats in a corporate box at a big game. Or a trip to the Barrier Reef.

If your group, school or club is looking for school fundraising ideas and easy fundraiser ideas, have a look at Goldstar Gifts and Stationary’s easy to manage ideas for fundraising.

June 3rd, 2009Interesting Stuff Read More >No Comments

Federation Internationale de Football Association Facts

FIFA is a Federation Internationale de Football Association that manages the worldwide game. This association was first introduced in the year 1904 and its first president was Robert Guerin. Previously, the European countries were playing under the Federation Internationale de Football Association, but after a few years, the non Euro nations also started participating in football for playing it internationally. Football was introduced in Olympics in London in the year 1908, but the first ever FIFA World Cup Tournament was played in the year 1930. The headquarters of the Federation Internationale de Football Association are located in Zurich, Switzerland.

Effect of First World War on FIFA
During the First World War, most of the national associations left FIFA. With the death of Daniel Burley Woolfall, FIFA was expected to fall apart within a few months. However, with the end of wars, the different nations united again and joined hands to make football popular among the youth, but the United Kingdom still denied to link with the world war enemies. Gradually, the national association members started increasing and currently, the Federation Internationale de Football Association integrates 208 members in all. The superlative body of FIFA is the FIFA congress that includes FIFA player agents and other members, as well. Some FIFA members also runs football tours and a football academy for young upcoming players.

Awards and Honors
FIFA is played after every four years and the title of FIFA World Player of the year is granted to the most prominent player. In addition to this, “FIFA World Cup All Time Team” and “FIFA Dream Team” are also announced to give honors to the prestigious players. FIFA also includes an anthem, which was composed by Franz Lambert. This anthem is played at the beginning of the matches like FIFA World Cup, FIFA Women’s World Cup and many others.

Tags: FIFA soccer football agents players

April 4th, 2009Interesting Stuff Read More >No Comments

The Development of Domestic Lighting

The phenomenon of magnetic and electric effects was studied by ancient Chinese, Greek and Roman historians.

In 1750, Benjamin Franklin, an American writer, tried to collect electrical charges in a kite during a thunderstorm. An Italian scientist and Professor of the University of Pavia made an appreciable step forwards with the discovery of the continuous electric current in 1800 which was named after him, called the Volta Pile. The announcement stunned the scientific world and it was from this basic concept that electric light was later developed.

There were several areas of investigation into the electric light, namely, the carbon arc, the incandescent filament bulb, gaseous discharge lights and chemical light.The carbon arc light was the earliest form of electric illumination.

In 1809 the English chemist Sir Humphrey Davy demonstrated his carbon arc lamp at The Royal Institute in London. His invention known as the electric arc light was not put to widespread use until the 1850s.

The sheer intensity of the light and the need for low voltage electricity prohibited its use in confined space unless the illumination was muted by blinds. It was used for street lighting and for lighthouses, but had largely been discontinued by WW I and replaced by other forms of electricity. However, carbon arc lighting was continued to be used in military applications like search lights on aircraft.

The Incandescent Bulb
The development of the incandescent bulb continued in parallel with that of the are light. In 1865, Hermann Sprengel invented a mercury vacuum pump which allowed a sufficiently high vacuum to be obtained in the bulb for further experiments on the filament to take place. The American, Thomas Edison (1847-1931) - who invented the telegraph — and the Englishman, Joseph Swan (1825-1914) are both credited with having discovered the incandescent filament bulb.

In 1878 Swan heated the filament while evacuating the bulb of its gases, so prolonging its life while Edison achieved 45 hours of illumination from his bulb in 1879. Refinements soon followed: Edison devised the screw-in brass cap and Swan the bayonet fitting. Both were marketing bulbs by the 1880s. A partnership was formed between Swan and Edison, creating the Edison & Swan United Company which later became Ediswan.

In 1881 The Engineer claimed that the first house to be completely illuminated by electricity was the house of Lord Kelvin, a close friend of Swan. His house in Glasgow had been lit by 106 gas burners which were converted to electric lights powered by a generator, driven by a gas engine.

In the same year, Sir William Armstrong, engineer and armament manufacturer, lit 45 electric lamps in his famous picturesque Cragside home at Newcastle-upon-Tyne, which had been designed by Norman Shaw in the early 1870s. The electricity was generated by a water turbine sited 1500 yards (1.3 km) from his home.

If you are in the market for house lights or holland blinds, contact Just Roller Blinds. Sales training by Macmahon. BS280309

Tags: blinds

March 28th, 2009Interesting Stuff Read More >No Comments

Your Attitude Determines Your Business Future

You have found a business for sale, you have bought it, so what now? With all the pieces of your new business just about in place, there is a crucial Issue to discuss, You. The most important ingredient in small business is the owner, and the most important ingredient in the owner is their attitude to both the business, and their customers.

Your attitude will to a great degree govern your success in business. Some people when they leave their jobs to start up their own business, unravel and get lazy. This is probably due to the fact they are no longer intimidated by the boss into doing the right thing. Self discipline can be a real problem with some people, they just can’t motivate themselves without some degree of external pressure. This, I believe is the biggest problem you will face.

You should watch for the warning signs, opening late, closing early, having long lunches, never getting jobs finished on time or at all, not returning calls, letting accounting paperwork lag behind, taking days off because you couldn’t be bothered working and so on. It is so easy to slip into bad habits, so be aware.

Try and remain accustomed to at least working the same hours as you were in your employed job and set yourself targets. Targets and goals will impose pressure on you to perform.

The next attitude problem comes from lack of determination.

Some small business owners fall to pieces every time there is problem or a crisis. This style of attitude will also assist you to go out of business very quickly.

You must never give up, for your own sake you must push on because you will strike plenty of problems and go through several serious crisis’s before things settle down, this is common to all new businesses.

The best thing to do is work through the problem in a calm and systematic way. Whilst you may feel at the time “this is the end” and “I’ve had enough”, this is a normal reaction that will pass. It often helps to join business groups and talk to other business owners about common problems.

You then must solve the problem and keep going. I’m sure attitude and determination has a lot to do with the 90% of businesses that fail. It’s ridiculous to think that a business goes down the drain because the owner had a poor attitude or “had a wobbly”, but it does happen. Make sure you’re not one of them.

The last issue to discuss is your attitude to customers. Keep this in mind, regardless of whether you like the particular person, all customers contribute to your profitability and success so treat them with respect and courtesy. It’s amazing how quickly customers will desert you if they feel you are rude to them. No customers - no money — no business! Always remain courteous, helpful and above all friendly, never allow personal or business problems to raise their heads in front of customers.The future of your business is in your hands.

If you are looking for a business for sale have a look at what http://www.business2sell.com.au/ has to offer. There is a huge range of businesses for sale listed, by both owner operators and business brokers. STB2S090309

Tags: businesses for sale attitude

March 9th, 2009Interesting Stuff Read More >No Comments

Tax Haven Strategies

tax-haven The use of tax havens in day to day corporate life has grown to be almost mainstream these days. To the small businessman and the private investor, the use of tax havens still probably seems a little shady.

This shouldn’t be the case any more as the use of tax havens to reduce tax or just defer it for a while is now accepted practice all over the world with many of the largest Australian accounting and audit firms having departments advising major corporations how to structure their operations offshore.

Tax havens have a strong appeal for many multi-national companies established in foreign countries because of the advantages they offer for the legitimate reduction or deferment of taxation on certain profits earned offshore. Profits harboured in a tax haven enable working capital to be used in the cheapest way possible.

Traditionally, the tax haven has been used as a central point for handling paperwork and preparing and processing international trade documents. Many companies utilise tax havens for the passage of title of goods, so these transfers can proceed without the need for mountains of regulations and fees.

Tax havens are also popular as places to administer patent, trademark and royalty agreements. Because of the intangible nature of patents, trademarks and royalty agreements, they are easily moved from one jurisdiction to the other and the cost of doing this is very low in tax haven jurisdictions.

For instance, if a company with branches and subsidiaries overseas is a resident of a country with strict foreign exchange regulations, it may not want to repatriate the profits simply because if it did, it may have problems being able to transfer the funds back out if it wanted to reinvest them offshore. To solve this problem, it establishes a foreign intermediate holding company in a tax haven, not for tax reasons, but to avoid the foreign exchange control problems that its own country has imposed.

By simply interposing a tax haven company in a corporate structure does not result in the reduction of onshore taxes in most cases, but it may allow tax deferral. Eventually, the parent company will receive the income and when it does it will be taxable and possibly without the benefit of foreign tax credits that may have been available had the profits been repatriated from a tax treaty country. Most tax havens don’t have tax treaties with major countries such as Australia, which prevents the favourable use of lower withholding taxes that would have been available had the country been a signatory to a tax treaty.

Offshore Licencing and Patent Holding Companies

Royalties or licence fees can be, in certain circumstances, can be feed of tax obligations by using an offshore licensing company. For instance, the owner of a patent can incorporate an offshore licensing company and assign the rights to that offshore company. In turn the offshore company then has the right to licence the patent to a foreign subsidiary. By having the royalties paid to the licensing company in a tax haven, profits are effectively shifted from the foreign subsidiary to the offshore patent owning company, which pays little or no tax on the royalties that it receives.

Income from other intangible rights, such as trade marks, copyrights, know how and franchising rights, can be earned without incurring withholding or income tax if a tax haven company is established to sublicence other companies in various countries. Tax savings can be made also on patent royalties by combining tax havens.

Australia only deducts 10% withholding tax on Dutch companies. Therefore, if a tax haven company was established in the Netherlands Antilles with a Dutch subsidiary, and licences its Dutch patents to the Dutch company, the Dutch company, in turn, can licence to the Australian manufacturer.

The Australian company can then pay the Dutch subsidiary patent royalties incurring only 10% tax. The Dutch company can then pay the royalty to the tax haven company (which is the patent owner), thereby avoiding Dutch withholding taxes on dividends. The Dutch company is not taxed in the Netherlands, and the tax haven company avoids any further taxation. Total tax is 10%.

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If you have a business for sale, make sure you visit http://www.business2sell.com.au/ This Australian business sales portal lists many quality businesses and is used by buyers, sellers and business brokers.

Tags: tax_haven tax business sales broker Australia Australian

March 4th, 2009Interesting Stuff Read More >No Comments

Nine words women use

1.) Fine: This is the word women use to end an argument when they are right and you need to shut up.

2.) Five Minutes: If she is getting dressed, this means a half an hour. Five minutes is only five minutes if you have just been given five more minutes to do what you’re doing before helping around the house.

3.) Nothing: This is the calm before the storm. This means something, and you should be on your toes. Arguments that begin with nothing usually end in “fine”.

4.) Go ahead: This is a dare, not permission. Don’t Do It! The best way to defuse this situtation is to say: “On second thought’s you’re right. I don’t know what I was thinking.”

5.) Loud sigh: This is actually a word, but it is often misunderstood by men. A loud sigh means she thinks you are an idiot and wonders why she is wasting her time standing here and arguing with you about nothing. (Refer back to #3 for the meaning of “nothing”.)

6.) That’s Okay: This is one of the most dangerous statements a women can make to a man. That’s okay means she wants to think long and hard before deciding how and when you will pay for your mistake.

7.) Thanks: A woman is thanking you, do not question, or faint. Just say “you’re welcome”.

8.) Whatever: Is a women’s way of saying “you’re dead”.

9.) Don’t worry about it, I’ve got it: Another dangerous statement, meaning this is something that a woman has told a man to do several times, but is now doing it herself. This will later result in a man asking `What’s wrong?’ For the women’s response refer to #3.

July 22nd, 2007Interesting Stuff Read More >No Comments

Engin review - VOIP service

My wife makes an average of 60 calls per month to Sydney from Brisbane at an average costs of $2.70 each. That’s $162 per month. She also has clients overseas in places like PNG and the middle east.

I’ve been thinking about signing up for one of those voice over the Internet services for years and finally last week I signed up with Engin. The signup process was easy and within 3 days I had my Engin voice box and a nifty little wireless phone. The plan I’ve signed up to is $10 per month and the phone cost $30 if I committed to 12 months.

So far I have been very impressed with the quality of service. We have Optus Cable Internet and a small wireless LAN at home. All I had to do to get it working was plug in the Engin box to the router, activate the service by e-mail and then power up the telephone.

The voice quality is very acceptable, about 90% as good as standard PSTN. The other impressive features are incoming call control, call blocking, time of day diversion and so on. A 4 hour call to Sydney costs us 10 cents. Overseas calls are about 3.5 cents per minute.

I have no idea how much bandwidth a call consumes, which can be important if you have a cap on your downloads and uploads. I suspect bandwidth consumption is around about 20 kilobits per second which equates to 150k per minute or 9 Mb per hour. It could be a lot less than that because I assume the gaps between words consume very little bandwidth.

I was a bit worried about what happens to the voice quality when shaping from the ISP kicks in. Once I hit my download limit on the cable Internet, Optus throttles me back to about 56Kbps. I noticed no change in the voice quality once my connection was throttled back to 56Kbps.

UPDATE - PROBLEMS WITH DROP OUTS

July 19th, 2007Interesting Stuff Read More >No Comments

Health Warning: How I ripped my scrotum open

Skin tag photo from Internet I had a nasty experience this week that lead to me ending up at the emergency ward of the local hospital. It is an embarrassing story, but an interesting story none the less.

I usually ride a bicycle to work and this particular day I had worn nylon swimming shorts instead of my normal bike shorts. These swimming shorts are the type that are lined with a white, mesh-type fabric.

To cut a long story short, I had a skin tag on the bottom of my scrotum about the size of a match head. It had been there for years and didn’t cause any discomfort so I had done nothing about it.

Unfortunately, during my ride home this skin tag had worked its way into a hole in the mesh lining of my swim shorts.

I was about to have a shower and pulled my shorts down. The next thing I know there’s blood all over the bathroom floor and a sharp pain in my crotch.

You guessed it, when I pulled my shorts down I ripped off the skin tag and about 2 cm of skin from my scrotum with it.

I had no idea that scrotums could bleed so much. In a calm, but shaky voice, I called my wife to come and help me.

Fighting back nausea from the sight of so much blood, she did a great job of patching me up using folded tissue and band aids.

I then waddled down the street to the local private hospital’s emergency department.

I told the triage nurse about my wound and asked for some stitches.

She asked me how it happened and in return I smiled a sick grin and asked her “do you really want to know?”

She paused for a few seconds and shaking her head said that she didn’t really want to. Trying to fight back giggles, she got me in to see the doctor.

He was very casual and professional about the whole story and suggested we try a special medical superglue. Holding the edges of the wound together he applied a bead of glue to the wound and held it together for about 30 seconds. The glue stung like hell, the gluing was even more painful than the initial injury.

He told me to wear jockey shorts for the rest of the week and that the glue would eventually drop off in a few days.

He was right. There was no swelling, no inflammation, and no pain. After three days I was back on the bike as good as new.

It cost me $250 for the treatment and I was in and out in 50 minutes. Medicare will pay all but $150 of it. I could have gone to the local public hospital but I didn’t feel like waiting for 7 hours just to have some overworked intern stitch me up in a very delicate place.

I’ll be wearing proper bike shorts from now on.

June 23rd, 2007Interesting Stuff Read More >No Comments

I’ve always loved demotivational posters

You’ve probably seen those trite posters featuring rowers, runners, concert musicians and so on working together as a team to achieve lofty goals. It’s all bullshit. Over the last 10 years a few enterprising individuals have cut through the crap and released a set of demotivational posters that tell it how it is. Here is a link to a collection and below is the latest crop: