Greg Davis - Technically Speaking

A product I have been using for the past 9 or 10 months for personal computer backups is from Mozy.  I do have an external hard drive for making backups of pictures and other files like many people do, but what if the house burns down (God forbid) or a pipe breaks and floods or some other disaster?  I also have to think to make those backups.  Enter Mozy Home. 

MozyHome currently supports Windows 2000, XP, and Vista and it is now also available for Mac OS X 10.4 and higher.  For a very reasonable price of $4.95 per month, you can download and install Mozy Home which will automatically run in the background (you can customize the options) and backup your files to an offsite server. Some of the features include:

 

If you are involved with video editing or post production work, you’ll enjoy this!  You can watch below or go here. (hit play and give it a few minutes to load).
 

Trans Siberian in Service from FC Post on Vimeo.

This was produced for the opening of a Christmas service at Fellowship Church (in Texas).  To read about how they did it, check out Pace Hartfield’s post here.  He is the Worship Pastor serving with Ed Young.  

(HT to Greg Atkinson)

Congratulations to the team at 30 Boxes on their recent Webware 100 Award. I happen to be an avid user of 30Boxes online calendar and can highly recommend it. It is simply easy to use, accessible via mobile devices, integrated with Facebook, Jott and you can even add-in other iCal format calendars. It certainly provides everything I’m looking for in a Web 2.0 calendar app at the right price - free! If you’ve been looking for something new or better than what you currently use, give 30 Boxes a try!

I really like the 3 products from 37signals, Backpack, Basecamp, and Highrise.  The latest updates to Basecamp are demonstrated below in this screencast and speak to the easy of use and elegant simplicity that are a hallmark of all 3 product offerings.  I’ve blogged about previous updates here and here. Unlike other companies they don’t rush to overload the product with so many features that they loose the simplicity of it in the process.

I highly recommend trying out all 3 for personal or group / organizational use. They do have free offerings in each you can start there to get a feel for them and then you can upgrade as you need or wish. It is a great way to boost productivity among work or volunteer groups. If want to know more about how I have used them personally or for church use, just let me know and I’d be glad to chat with you about it.

Advanced Ministries is a new offering that I have just stumbled upon today (actually as a sponsered Facebook ad).  I really like the look and feel of their site and their product offering which includes a basic site for free.

Their stated purpose is:

AdvancedMinistry is created by Electricurrent for the purpose of providing ministries, churches and Christian artists with an affordable web solution. As a strategic communications firm, Electricurrent focuses on branding initiatives, design, websites, commerce engines, content portals, and online communities.

They also have a demo you can watch which explains the color-coded pricing options.  If you are looking to upgrade your site but don’t have the technical folks in house to do it, this might be a good option to consider.

I also liked the interesting approach to their mission:

Electricurrent’s mission is two-fold:

1. To generate revenues in the corporate sector so that we can put our time and efforts back into various ministries and non-profit organizations.
2. To set a standard of excellence within the Christian community (through projects like AdvancedMinistry, ChristSites and The Jesus Project).

 Has anyone used their services before?

 

For 2008, one of my goals is to grow closer to Christ and I felt that I a new perspective was in order to help with that.  Thanks to Brian Bailey who shared about Solo: The Uncommon Devotional  in this post.  It is a very different but interesting approach to studying God’s Word. I have been enjoying its easy of use and its daily format which is broken into four parts of:

• Read
• Think
• Pray
• Live

It is easy to use which is especially important to helping me be more constant with it. It allows you to dive into the scripture, but encourages you to really dwell on what the Lord is saying to you and allow the message of it to really come alive. One of the things it encourages you to do is to keep a prayer journal.  Being someone who can usually express my thoughts and feelings better in writing, I do find this especially helpful to me.  Being the natural geek, I have also found it easier and more meaningful for me to keep my prayer journal in the form of a blog (which I keep private) that I can access anywhere (and even post to from my mobile phone).

Along with this I have also started using the new online Bible, YouVersion, from the guys at LifeChurch.tv.  I’ve added their intro clip below in which Bobby Gruenewald and Terry Storch talk about what it is all about, but in summary it is a very interesting way in which you can not only study the Bible in many different versions but also share your thoughts with others and make links to video, pictures and other sites that help you relate to the passage.  It is a revolutionary new method to Bible study that allows you also grow and learn from others.  I’d recommend giving it a try - nothing to loose when the price is FREE!

Organize - YouVersion empowers you to organize the content that’s important to you!
Share - Simply share meaningful content with anyone, anytime, anywhere.
Community - YouVersion makes it easy to connect and collaborate with others.
Contribute - With YouVersion you have the power to share your content with your closest friends, family, or anyone online!

 

 I hope you find the method that works for you and that you allow the Word to get into your heart and mind so that your ministry will be all that it can be in 2008!

Here is a good example of using technology to get main idea from a sermon out to your listeners. Ed Young, Jr, Senior Pastor at Fellowship Church gives this message on listening to the wrong “they”.  With many free and easy to use resources like YouTube, Facebook, MyChurch and many others, are you taking advantage of them to get your message heard?