Top 10 passwords to avoid

Have you ever lost your keys and searched everywhere only to find them still in the open door?

House keys are just like network passwords. They protect your valuable files and organizational information.

But according to a recent study by Impervia, too many computer users today have passwords which are easily compromised. Here are the top 10 passwords on a recently hacked social networking website.

1. 123456
2. 12345
3. 123456789
4. Password
5. iloveyou
6. princess
7. rockyou
8. 1234567
9. 12345678
10. abc123

To protect your data, Impervia recommends the following when creating or changing your password:

A. Avoid names, slang words, dictionary words or trivial passwords (consecutive digits, adjacent keyboard keys. etc)
B. Choose a password with eight or more characters. 50% of all passwords are seven characters or less.
C. Your password should contain a mix of four different types of characters—upper case letters, lower case letters, numbers and special characters such as !@#$%^&.
D. Take a sentence and turn it into a password…something like “This little piggy went to market” might become “tlpWENT2m”

Don’t leave your keys (passwords) in the door for just anyone to walk in and steal your intellectual property.

Joining Forces in the Back Office

The Chronicle of Philanthropy is sponsoring a webinar next Wednesday, June 3rd featuring several successful back office collaborations like Upic Solutions.

Earlier today, I spoke with Nicole Wallace, senior writer with the Chronicle, who is moderating the webinar next week to share our experience as collaborative. Upic may be mentioned in next week's webinar as another successful example of non-profit collaboration.

Presenters include:

MACC CommonWealth Services, an organization in Minneapolis created by five social-services groups to provide their finance, human-resources, and technology operations. The new group was formed in January 2007 by putting the administrative employees of the five charities together in one office. The result has been that each group can draw on the expertise of a staff of 20 employees.

Chattanooga Museum Collaboration which started out in 2001 as a fee-for-service arrangement in which the Tennessee Aquarium provided finance, human-resources, and technology services for the Hunter Museum of American Art and the Creative Discovery Museum. But over time, it has expanded. The organizations now work together on programs, like exhibits and summer camps, and with the city of Chattanooga conducted a joint capital campaign.

Lodestar Foundation, in Phoenix AZ whose mission is to expand the growth and impact of philanthropy by supporting long-term collaborations among nonprofit groups working in the same area in order to increase efficiency and impact and eliminate duplication of efforts, and programs that promote philanthropy, volunteerism and public service. The Lodestar Foundation created and funded the wildly successful The Collaboration Prize.

For more information and to register, please click here.

How about FREE training on Inbound Marketing?

One of my favorite social media resources is the weekly webcast (4:00 pm Eastern on Fridays) from HubSpot, also available as a free download on i-Tunes.

Earlier today, HubSpot announced a series of free webcasts for Inbound Marketing University the week of June 15-19, which provides the foundation for a certification program after one week of study.

I believe the United Way system would benefit greatly from a change in marketing philosophy from herding people into rallies to permission-based, personal communications. I've watched every HubSpot TV podcast and I am very impressed by the folks there.

Make sure to follow HubSpot on Twitter and read the blog post on Inbound Marketing University for more details.

Upic bids on 2010 Andar conference

It's been a month since the last post. We've been working on many new projects, including bringing affordable training opportunities to our members.

Upic selected Andar 360 as our standard campaign management application in 2001 and was one of the early adopters of this platform. Today, Andar has nearly 70% market share of the United Way in the U.S. Each year, Andar's United Way user community meets to review and propose product enhancements.

Upic's headquarters location in Cincinnati, OH is one of five finalists to host the Andar 2010 conference. We have secured the region's premiere technology conference center and several hotel options at $99/less per night to bring this conference to Cincinnati next April.

For more information on the Cincinnati 2010 Andar Conference, please visit www.upicsolutions.org/2010andar. Voting begins soon, so when you or your organization receives a ballot, please select Cincinnati.

Andar User Group survey results

The results are in for last week's Andar User Group survey. Twenty three people responded. Upic staff will attend the following sessions, based upon the survey results and other sessions of note:

Community Building Track: Speakers, Tours & Fairs Management (M-9:45a); MIG General Features (M-2:30p); Volunteer Management (M-4:00p); Subscriptions, Mass Email & Tracking (T-8:00a); Agency Training Best Practices (T-(9:45a); Andar Standards & Protocols (T-1:45p); Andar Surveys (T-3:00p); MIG Prospect Plans, Communications & Surveys (W-9:45a); Communications Log & Andar Connector (W-1:00p); Event Management (W-2:15p)

Resource Development Track: Intro to Campaign (M-9:45a); MIG Special Campaigns & Gift Relationships (M-12:45p); Intro to Campaign Reporting (M-2:30p); Hot Topics for Campaigners (M-4:00p); Campaign Reporting (T-8am); MIG Prospecting (T-9:45a); DB2 (T-1:15p); Campaign Rollover (T-3:00p); Leadership Functionality (W-8:00a); Demographics vs. Techniques (W-1:00p); Andar Connector (W-4:00p)

IT/Other Track: Core Enhancements (M-9:45a); CB Enhancements (M-12:45p); Andar 2020 (M-4:00p); IT-Training Best Practices (W-8:00a); Leadership Best Practices (W-2:15p); CB-Best Practices, Standards & Protocols (W-4:00p)

Modules Track: Content Management (M-12:45p); MIG Module (T-1:15p); CRM New Features (T-3:00p)

Training Lab Track: Data Mining Basics (T-8:00a); Mailing Lists (T-9:45a); CB Data Mining (T-1:45p)

Finance Track: Intro to Finance (M-8:45a); Processing (M-10:00a); Credit Card/ACH Module (M-2:30p); Patriot Act Compliance Tracking (M-4:00p); DC Master Accounts (T-9:45a)

ePledge/eCommunity Track: CB Budgets & Demographics (M-21:30p); Logic Module & Outcomes (T-8:00a); epledge Notes & Options (W-8:00a); ePledge Training for Companies (W-1:00p); CB Dashboard & Custom Bio Tabs (T-3:00p); Campaign Managers Online review (W-4:00p)

See this link for the full survey results: http://tinyurl.com/dgbml9

Andar Users Group survey

With the tough economic conditions, many Upic members have reduced the number of staff travelling to the Andar User group next month in Charlotte, NC.

Upic is sending several of our staff to the conference to obtain training information/materials from the most important sessions. We are committed to attending the top 2 sessions per time slot as voted by our members in this survey. We will develop future Upic web-based training options from the information we gather via this survey.

Please use this schedule to determine your priority sessions as the survey does not list individual sessions, just time slots and categories.

This survey will close at 5:00 pm Eastern time on Friday, February 20th and is limited to the first 100 responses.

Click here for the one page survey: http://tinyurl.com/as5bf7

MS Office tips-now at Upic University

Looking for tips on how to do a mail merge or perhaps how to set up your out of office message in Outlook?

Upic University's on-demand training sessions now include several Microsoft Office tips as an optional menu item.

Each Upic member has access to a growing list of on-demand webinars, based upon your organization's membership profile.

To instructions on how to enroll, visit www.upicsolutions.org/ondemand.

Wikis in Plain English-Video

Wonder whether wiki writing would work well for United Way? (Try saying that three times fast).

Maybe you are wondering what is a wiki? The following Common Craft video explains all in about 4 minutes.



Upic is reviewing potential wiki platforms as a forum for our members to share best practices with one another. We believe that a wiki will assist all of our members in learning more about technology and ways we can all be more effective in our work. Watch this space for more on Upic's wiki community.

P.S. We're looking for a creative name for our community's wiki, please submit a comment below. We'll provide a gift card for the winning submission.

Top 10 computer passwords

Friends don't let friends use dumb passwords. So, please, PLEASE make sure you avoid using one of Top 10 Computer Passwords for your Upic network sign-in.

It won't take a rocket scientist to guess that "letmein" or "qwerty" or "123456" are in the top 10 computer password lists. But you may be surprised what else makes the list (from the UK).

And no, "2hot4u" did not make the list in England.

Video: Web Search Strategies in Plain English

Google is now a verb, meaning to search on the internet. After watching this video, you will be able to filter "Billy Ray Cyrus" out of your search results for a type of fish.

Now I can search with more focus and better results, thanks to the latest "You Tube" video on web searches from CommonCraft. Enjoy!

Upic on-demand training reviews

The reviews are in and Upic's on-demand training series is a hit.
See what our members are saying:

"The Upic on-demand webinars are exactly what our United Way has needed. The step-by-step instructions are done at a perfect pace and the fact that no sessions are longer than 10 minutes allows you to fit it into your schedule very easily. The classes cover important subjects and no matter what level of user you are, you will certainly learn something new". --Rick Collins, AVP of Information Management, United Way of Central Ohio (Columbus, OH)

"I volunteered to be part of a "pilot program" focused on using the Upic video training course. I really didn't know what to expect and sort of thought it would just be boring. I was wrong! It's very interesting, clearly written and so easy to understand. The courses are given in plain, understandable English and you don't have to be a computer genius to understand what they are talking about. I would love it if the online college courses I'm taking right now were even HALF as clear as the Upic courses! " -- Sandy Burleson, 211 Remote Information & Referral Specialist, United Way of Asheville and Buncombe County (Asheville, NC)

Video: Social Media in Plain English

Welcome to Scoopville. Big Ice Cream Company is facing a big challenge from a new invention.

This very entertaining video focuses on basics of social media: the new technology that makes everyone a producer and easy to use tools that give everyone a chance to have a say.

"YouTube" video and transcript of CommonCraft's Social Media in Plain English. Enjoy!

The Machine is Us...Web 2.0 video

This "YouTube" video shows the how much Web 2.0 is changing the way we use the Internet in a short and entertaining way.

The title of this is "The Machine is Us/ing Us".

From the opening of the Web 2.0 University session yesterday.

Let me know what you think...

Web 2.0. Is the United Way ready?

Greetings from the NKU Web 2.0 conference. Over the next several weeks, I will be unpacking their content into multiple blog entries and prevocative thoughts for our United Way system. I encourage you to help us by submitting your questions and comments directly on this blog so that we can all share in the conversation. All Web 2.0 posts are tagged so that you can quickly reference all of these topics.

So, the big question today...is the United Way ready to exist in the new world of Web 2.0? I submit for your review an example of why I say we are not.

Today, many people use the web for research before making purchasing decisions. One of the largest references on the web is Wikipedia. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia written collaboratively by many of its readers. Independent studies confirm that Wikipedia content is just as accurate as commercial encyclopedias, but has vastly more information available for research.

The challenge: Look up United Way. You will get four related articles. Check out the United Way of America entry. I submit that United Way is largely absent in the community of Wikipedia writers.

Isn't it interesting that United Way is defined with nearly 25% of the article devoted to "criticism and scandals"? Note that the recent events in Charlotte are referenced. Where are the third party examples of local United Way results?

This article represents the contemporary view of the community of Wikipedia writers. Verifiable sources are preferred to PR or marketing postings. The community of Wikipedia writers is self-managing and the power of the community is greater than any individual or organization.

United Way has a long and proud tradition in building communities. So how are we doing in building community online? Discuss...

Web 2.0 Seminar @ NKU

Many United Ways are interested in the next generation of web tools to help them build and maintain relationships with their constituents. This next generation of interactive tools are dubbed Web 2.0.

Northern Kentucky University is hosting two separate Web 2.0 seminars on September 23 and 24 for the low price of $99 per session. The sessions will be at the NKU METS Center which is located adjacent to the Cincinnati airport.

NKU recently published more information about the seminars via the following links.

• 9/23: Enterprise 2.0 (Executive Overview)
• 9/24: Implementing Enterprise 2.0 (Technical Overview)
• Registration link
• Nearby hotel options (see Airport grouping of hotels)
• Web 2.0 seminar at greatly reduced prices (prior posting)

On-Demand Training Sample

Introducing training on your schedule. Upic is now offering short, topic-specific training opportunities on a variety of Upic Solutions services. Check out the Upic Solutions On-Demand Training series by watching this 2 minute video.

When you are ready to enroll, either submit a help desk ticket or email our Upic University staff. Our On-Demand Training series is free for all Upic Solutions members based upon the Upic service levels purchased by your organization.

Prior posting: On Demand training webinars (part 1)

On Demand training webinars (part 1)

Introducing Upic Solutions On-Demand Training Series!

We know that your time is valuable...that's why we've developed 5-8 minute mini-webinars on various Upic services.

These sessions are free to all Upic members and may be viewed at any time from any broadband internet location. We even provide completion certificates after each track.

To sign up for our pilot of the on-demand classes, please contact the Upic University registrar. You will be enrolled in classes that correspond to your United Way's service level.

Orientation Track (All Upic members)
Designed to assist new Upic members with the basics of Upic University, our Help Desk, and Virtual Office navigation. Each class is approximately five minutes in length.
1. Welcome to Upic University
2. Creating a Help Desk Ticket
3. Logging into Virtual Office

Virtual Office Track (Virtual Office service members)
Designed to assist Upic members with the basics of Upic Virtual Office (VO) system. Each class is approximately five minutes in length.
1. Logging into Virtual Office
2. Options & Settings
3. Spam Filter overview
4. Web Filter overview (in production)
5. Printing in Virtual Office (in production)

Watch this space for more information on additional on-demand webinars.

Web 2.0 seminar at greatly reduced prices

Many of Upic's members are looking for the next generation platform that will provide interactivity and personalized content to individual United Way supporters and volunteers. Within the technology community, these tools are commonly referred to as Web 2.0.

Upic enjoys a wonderful relationship with Northern Kentucky University's Infrastructure Management Institute who is sponsoring a national program on Web 2.0 University September 23 and 24th.

This same seminar costs nearly $900/day Chicago and Boston, but through NKU and related sponsorships only costs $99/each day via this registration link. (Thanks PRosh for the correction).

For hotel discounts, please contact us at this link.