January 20th, 2005 Well, a brand new year has started and with it comes a fabulous new feature from CEOExpress. A number of members have been working with us on the development of our new "RSS News Center" and we have now launched it to our entire Select audience. Today on your CEOExpress Personal page you will see the new RSS center and news ticker. January New and Notable: Announcing the NEW CEOExpress RSS News Center: "RSS" stands for "Rich Site Summary" or "Really Simple Syndication." RSS is a format for syndicating news and the content of news sites, including most major news sites like the NYTimes, Washington Post, BBC, CNET or ESPN, along with "Blogs" and technical information sites. On your end, our RSS Center provides you with the ability to effortlessly build a custom "newspaper" from your favorite sources. You can also specify what news you want in your news ticker on your homepage. So, how do you use the CEOExpress RSS Center? Well first off, relax—we've set up a "default" set of news feeds and headlines with a "best guess" of what we thought you'd be interested in. You can just sit back and use what I've chosen for you and never change anything. But, that would be a shame, since it is SO cool. It will work equally well for both newbies and executive geeks There are two components to our new RSS Center. First is your new news headlines ticker. Your old news ticker displayed headlines only from the New York Times. With the new RSS Center, you will be able to choose five news feeds from your custom list of provided feeds to display in your personal news ticker. My new ticker, for instance, features headlines from the Boston Globe, BBC headlines, Yahoo Business, NYTimes front page, and ESPN Football (Go Pats!:-) Second is the RSS Center itself. In the RSS Center you can view headlines and manage feeds from the extensive feed directory that we have built, including Business, Technology, World News, Sports, Arts and Entertainment, and more. You can choose which feeds you want displayed in your RSS Center, organize feeds into folders, clip headlines to save articles to your own research library, and search feeds for specific subjects. I'd like to offer special thanks to our RSS Center beta testers for their time and helpful comments. Now we ask that you all become beta testers. Begin using the RSS Center and headline ticker every day. Kick it around, and whenever you have a question or suggestion, use the Beta Feedback form in the RSS Center to contact us. We want to make the RSS center as easy and as useful as possible. To see where to find the headline ticker and RSS Center on your CEOExpress desktop, click here. Make certain you watch the RSS Center demo by clicking here. Future Feature: Later this year, we will be launching another new feature, the CEOExpress Business Directory, which will enable the CEOExpress audience members to do business with one another. The Directory will allow you to enter your business information and contact info into a directory accessible by all CEOExpress users. CEOExpressSelect members, as well as our public site users will be able to view the directory, and enter their company information. However, position preference at the top of each category will be given to CEOExpressSelect members. Please look in next month's newsletter for more details. CEOExpress Corporate Update: Over the last several months, we've made a number of changes and improvements to CEOExpress Corporate, our private label portals. We've updated the look and layout, and added a great new navigation system. And now our polls and forums are available as a feature on CEOExpress Corporate portals. The RSS news center capability will be added to the corporate product this quarter and right after that, the business directory. To see our new look and features, please check out or new Corporate brochure, and don't hesitate to contact me with any questions or for an online demonstration. January Software Tip: This is more a hardware tip, and an old one at that, but if I didn't know about it until last week, I am assuming some of you don't either. So, I have a tiny and terrific I-River MP3 player that I use for both music and books when I am working out in the gym. I also listen to audio book CDs when I travel back and forth from Boston to Vermont. I was mulling over getting a subscription to an audio book download site, but since I like to listen to books in the car, I also need CDs. I didn't want the hassle of having to burn CDs from a download or the headaches of trying to work around a system that might not want me to burn Microsoft (WMA) compatible CDs. As I was complaining about my dilemma in the middle of the office, Toby said to me "Why don't you just get a cassette converter?" I said "A what?" Well, to make an already long story less long, Toby picked up a cassette converter for me. I put this gizmo into my cassette slot in my car, plugged it into my MP3Player, and voila!, not only does it work like a dream, I could run my entire MP3 directory through the control buttons on my steering wheel. Perfect. It works for CDs also! Available everywhere under $20. Many of you may be saying "she didn't know about that old trick?" Well, no, she didn't, and I was very excited about it. Helpful Hints from CEOExpress: Scratch Pad Reminder Notes: The reminder notes in your Scratch pad can appear as a pop-up. If you want to this great feature, you will need to allow pop-ups from CEOExpress. One-Click Customization: If you have upgraded to XP Service Pack 2, you may experience problems with your One-Click Customization. If you already have One-Click, and it is not working, please delete it, and add it again. (To delete One-Click, simply right click on the link in your Links toolbar and select “Delete.”) In order to add One-Click with SP2, please follow these instructions: 1. Add *.ceoexpress.com to your Trusted Zone. (Click here for a demo.) 2. Drag and drop the One-Click button to your Links toolbar. 3. You can then remove *.ceoexpress.com from your Trusted Zone if you'd like, or leave it (we are trustworthy). Please note: The new version of One-Click is not a pop-up, so the ability to use One-Click will not be affected by your pop-up blocker. Newsletter Archive: To refer to a previous newsletter, visit our Newsletter Archive, which can now be found on both the 'Customize Your Page' and 'Scratch Pad and Notes' pages. Sponsor The Best of the Web in one subscription–Free 30 day Trial The Business Network delivers unified access to the Wall Street Journal Online, Economist.com, Harvard Management Update, MIT’s TechnologyReview.com, Encyclopedia Britannica Online, and getAbstract’s business book summaries in one subscription. Risk Free. Try it now. Happy belated New Year and I look forward to ideas for 2005. As usual, feel free to send me a note. Patricia Pomerleau CEO CEOExpress Company 617 482 1200 RSS Center Screenshot | RSS Center Demo | Corporate Brochure | Newsletter Archives