Downsizing Your Storage Room

Humans are creatures of habit. The longer we live at a residence, the more inanimate objects we tend to accumulate. It isn't unusual for people to park their cars outside because their garage acts as an extra storage facility.

The key to chipping away at the stacks of boxes and books is organization. What may seem like a daunting task can be simplified to three piles:

1. Keep it.
2. Toss it. 
3. Donate it.

Colored glassware, old books and toys, silverware, baseball cards, salt and pepper shakers, there is someone out there who may want your stuff. Before you decide to toss an item, carefully think if it could possibly fall into a collectible category or if someone less fortunate than you, who might be starting from scratch, could use it.

If an item is simply not worthy of donating or keeping, before you toss it, can it be recycled? If not, then you put it in the garbage.

Check out your local homeless shelters and organizations that you could donate your things to. Some of them may have the ability to pick large items up.

For more tips and ideas, check out this tutorial that will help you assess if it really needs to be in your house.

The Coolest Singer/Songwriter from Down Under

Established and up and coming songsters could learn a thing or two from Australia-born singer Meri Amber. When it comes to promoting her music in the digital universe, this geek girl is doing it right.

She took Virtual Newsmakers out the old year and brought in the new with crew Cynthia K. Seymour and Debbie Elicksen back in 2013. The discussion stretched around the distribution platforms artists are now privy to flogging their wares, such as Spotify, MySpace, and BandCamp.

Amber says because social media is structured and fluid at the same time, it's important to be balanced and human. Treat social media as a conversation, not as a place to put up posters.

During the broadcast, Amber entertained the audience with three of her songs.

Transmedia 2.0

Transmedia is a journey to tell better stories, where the audience gets to be a part of the creative process. They get to write part of the script.

Nuno Bernardo is an Emmy-nominated transmedia writer and producer. His inspiration came from the Orson Welles radio play "The War of the Worlds." It's where he learned the true meaning of transmedia: doing a story in a different way.

Anyone's audience (or client-base) communicates and watches media from their own devices at their own pace. The key to a successful transmedia campaign is to fit into the audience's daily routine.

Bernardo will inspire you to look at how you market in a different way.

Getting A Game Day Face For the Web

For those who know very little about makeup and who need a pictorial step-by-step guide on how to apply, this web show is for you.

Terry Jacobs is an internationally known makeup artist who graciously gave the Virtual Newsmakers duo a free lesson.

If you can't fathom leaving the house without makeup, you wouldn't be caught dead broadcasting a live show to the Internet without makeup. Kudos to Cynthia Seymour for putting on a brave face in this demonstration.

If truth be told, your Virtual Newsmakers hosts sometimes scramble at the last minute to "put their faces" on before clicking the On Air switch in the Hangout. So as to not let Cynthia face the camera naked alone, Debbie Elicksen captured her own primping routine.

The Launch Into G+ Hangouts

Chris Yates was a trooper. He graciously stepped in to save our launch when another guest had to reschedule.

He was no stranger to media, having started out as a traditional television broadcaster then turned to webcasting. We knew we could learn a lot from him.

One of the best moments of the show was when he described his interview with Grumpy Cat at the 2013 SxSW. 

One of his nuggets is something we can verify as we have worked through some technical challenges in creating the Virtual Newsmakers Show. He says when you are just starting off, you are going to suck on camera. So suck early and suck often... and get it out of the way.  

Even with some prep time leading up to the launch, poor and spotty Internet connections sometimes took away from the fluidity of our earlier shows. People bounced off and came back in...like the hosts. But it was a great beginning and we knew we were going to have a blast.

Virtual Newsmakers is co-hosted by Cynthia K. Seymour and Debbie Elicksen.