Lesha Hays -Hays Real Estate Inc.
In Berea, KY
Email- leshahays@earthlink.net
Website- www.leshahays.com
Phone- (859) 626-2497 or (859) 986-8663
I’ve been serving Central Kentucky since 1995. A honest and loyal Real Estate Broker that will meet all of your needs!
I work with buyers and sellers. I use all of the technology that is possible to supply a great service to you.
Click on the above link to see what you need to know for your 2011 Tax Filing and what is new for 2012!
So you modeled lingerie and the photographer posted the shots on his website. Or you ranted about your former employer on your MySpace. Or your friend posted a photo of you after you had a few too many at a party five years ago.
So what? What you do in your private time is your own business right?
Wrong.
Digital dirt is derailing an increasing number of job searches, as recruiters’ use of search engines increase, according to research conducted by ExecuNet, a career and business networking organization.
A recent update of exhaustive research compiled by the company revealed that the influence of online research on hiring is on the rise: while 2005 saw 75 per cent of recruiters use search engines to learn more about candidates, with 26 per cent eliminating candidates based on what they found, that number rose to 83 per cent, with 43 per cent eliminated based on online findings last year.
“For better or worse, the internet provides recruiters and employers with a wealth of unfiltered information that’s used to help evaluate candidates,” says ExecuNet CEO Dave Opton. “From a candidate’s perspective, there’s no question that managing your reputation online is as important as it is offline.”
Still, young job seekers are just waking up to the idea that their online profiles may be damaging their job chances, says Jennifer Kushell, president and co-founder of YSN.com, an online career site for young adults, and co-author of the New York Times best seller, Secrets of the Young & Successful.
“We just finished a study of graduating students from 50 countries that we’ll be releasing in the fall, and while these are not yet final numbers, our tabulations to date have shown that more than a quarter of them said that there is ‘definitely or probably something online about them that they would not want their parents or employers to see,’” says Kushell, whose own company recently rejected a candidate after Googling her.
“Our head of operations asked this girl in for an interview for an operations position, but then he Googled and her MySpace profile popped up. The first song that started playing was Crazy Bitch by Buckcherry, and then there were long rants about her current employer with plenty of expletives,” relates Kushell. “Our head of operations emailed her and withdrew the offer for the interview and then recommended that she put her MySpace settings on private, as the page would be very damaging to her in her job hunt. An hour later she had taken the stuff down, but she also wrote back to tell us how terrible it was that we were rejecting her based on something that was on her personal profile.”
Companies have the right to do background checks on the net, says Toronto-based employment lawyer and newspaper columnist Daniel Lublin. He recently represented a young woman who lost her employment offer when the pharmaceutical company she was working for found photos of her posing in lingerie on the internet.
“We settled, but she still didn’t get the job,” says Lublin, adding, “The only area of concern would have been if the employer had made a discriminatory decision not to employ the candidate based on factors protected under the Charter of Human Rights.”
Under the charter, employers can’t discriminate against a potential employee based on their race, religion, sexual orientation etc. Of course, proving an employer has made a hiring decision on such grounds is near impossible, especially if the decision is made as a result of an online search.
Employers can candidates based on their ‘character’, points out Lublin, adding the employer can make that determination based on web search findings. “There is no law in Canada prohibiting employers from accessing publicly available information,” says the employment lawyer.
So is the person interviewing you going to perform a search the moment you leave their office? Few recruiters will openly admit to Googling candidates, but that doesn’t mean they’re not doing it.
“It’s not something that’s officially used during recruiting but it is emerging as a practice,” says Donna Smith, VP of Career Edge, a non-profit organization. The Career Edge internship program arranges internships between Canadian graduates who need entry-level experience and employers who need bright, young talent. “Student job seekers should keep in mind that a recruiter is not going to be impressed by a photo on the internet of, let’s say, a girl in a bikini top or a guy wearing a beer-chugging hat.”
It’s all about demonstrating good judgment on what’s business appropriate, says Smith, adding recruiters may not even bother looking at a résumé that’s been sent by someone with an email like sweetheart @ hotmail.com.
Students should also be careful when Googling companies they’re interested in, she adds. “I witnessed one case, where a student being interviewed told the recruiter they had something in common because they both went to the same university,” says Smith. “The recruiter did not react well. After all, the recruiter was there to interview the student, not the other way around.” jp
3 bedroom, 2 bath ranch, with tile, hardwood, ceiling fans, covered porch. Complete kitchen setup includes refrigerator, dishwasher, microwave, and self cleaning range.
Contact Lesha Hays:
Phone- 859-626-2497
Email- leshahays@earthlink.net
By: David Carr
Published: January 1, 2010
I can remember when I first thought seriously about Twitter. Last March, I was at the SXSW conference, a conclave in Austin, Tex., where technology, media and music are mashed up and re-imagined, and, not so coincidentally, where Twitter first rolled out in 2007. As someone who was oversubscribed on Facebook, overwhelmed by the computer-generated RSS feeds of news that came flying at me, and swamped by incoming e-mail messages, the last thing I wanted was one more Web-borne intrusion into my life.
And then there was the name. Twitter.
In the pantheon of digital nomenclature — brands within a sector of the economy that grew so fast that all the sensible names were quickly taken — it would be hard to come up with a noun more trite than Twitter. It impugns itself, promising something slight and inconsequential, yet another way to make hours disappear and have nothing to show for it. And just in case the noun is not sufficiently indicting, the verb, “to tweet” is even more embarrassing.
Beyond the dippy lingo, the idea that something intelligent, something worthy of mindshare, might occur in the space of 140 characters — Twitter’s parameters were set by what would fit in a text message on a phone — seems unlikely.
But it was clear that at the conference, the primary news platform was Twitter, with real-time annotation of the panels on stage and critical updates about what was happening elsewhere at a very hectic convention. At 52, I succumbed, partly out of professional necessity.
And now, nearly a year later, has Twitter turned my brain to mush? No, I’m in narrative on more things in a given moment than I ever thought possible, and instead of spending a half-hour surfing in search of illumination, I get a sense of the day’s news and how people are reacting to it in the time that it takes to wait for coffee at Starbucks. Yes, I worry about my ability to think long thoughts — where was I, anyway? — but the tradeoff has been worth it.
Some time soon, the company won’t say when, the 100-millionth person will have signed on to Twitter to follow and be followed by friends and strangers. That may sound like a MySpace waiting to happen — remember MySpace? — but I’m convinced Twitter is here to stay.
And I’m not alone.
“The history of the Internet suggests that there have been cool Web sites that go in and out of fashion and then there have been open standards that become plumbing,” said Steven Johnson, the author and technology observer who wrote a seminal piece about Twitter for Time last June. “Twitter is looking more and more like plumbing, and plumbing is eternal.”
Really? What could anyone possibly find useful in this cacophony of short-burst communication?
Well, that depends on whom you ask, but more importantly whom you follow. On Twitter, anyone may follow anyone, but there is very little expectation of reciprocity. By carefully curating the people you follow, Twitter becomes an always-on data stream from really bright people in their respective fields, whose tweets are often full of links to incredibly vital, timely information.
The most frequent objection to Twitter is a predictable one: “I don’t need to know someone is eating a donut right now.” But if that someone is a serious user of Twitter, she or he might actually be eating the curmudgeon’s lunch, racing ahead with a clear, up-to-the-second picture of an increasingly connected, busy world. The service has obvious utility for a journalist, but no matter what business you are in, imagine knowing what the thought leaders in your industry were reading and considering. And beyond following specific individuals, Twitter hash tags allow you to go deep into interests and obsession: #rollerderby, #physics, #puppets and #Avatar, to name just a few of many thousands.
The act of publishing on Twitter is so friction-free — a few keystrokes and hit send — that you can forget that others are out there listening. I was on a Virgin America cross-country flight, and used its wireless connection to tweet about the fact that the guy next to me seemed to be the leader of a cult involving Axe body spray. A half-hour later, a steward approached me and said he wondered if I would be more comfortable with a seat in the bulkhead. (He turned out to be a great guy, but I was doing a story involving another part of the company, so I had to decline the offer. @VirginAmerica, its corporate Twitter account, sent me a message afterward saying perhaps it should develop a screening process for Axe. It was creepy and comforting all at once.)
Like many newbies on Twitter, I vastly overestimated the importance of broadcasting on Twitter and after a while, I realized that I was not Moses and neither Twitter nor its users were wondering what I thought. Nearly a year in, I’ve come to understand that the real value of the service is listening to a wired collective voice.
Not that long ago, I was at a conference at Yale and looked at the sea of open laptops in the seats in front of me. So why wasn’t my laptop open? Because I follow people on Twitter who serve as my Web-crawling proxies, each of them tweeting links that I could examine and read on a Blackberry. Regardless of where I am, I surf far less than I used to.
At first, Twitter can be overwhelming, but think of it as a river of data rushing past that I dip a cup into every once in a while. Much of what I need to know is in that cup: if it looks like Apple is going to demo its new tablet, or Amazon sold more Kindles than actual books at Christmas, or the final vote in the Senate gets locked in on health care, I almost always learn about it first on Twitter.
The expressive limits of a kind of narrative developed from text messages, with less space to digress or explain than this sentence, has significant upsides. The best people on Twitter communicate with economy and precision, with each element — links, hash tags and comments — freighted with meaning. Professional acquaintances whom I find insufferable on every other platform suddenly become interesting within the confines of Twitter.
Twitter is incredibly customizable, with little of the social expectations that go with Facebook. Depending on whom you follow, Twitter can reveal a nation riveted by the last episode of “Jersey Shore” or a short-form conclave of brilliance. There is plenty of nonsense — #Tiger had quite a run — but there are rich threads on the day’s news and bravura solo performances from learned autodidacts. And the ethos of Twitter, which is based on self-defining groups, is far more well-mannered than many parts of the Web — more Toastmasters than mosh pit. On Twitter, you are your avatar and your avatar is you, so best not to act like a lout and when people want to flame you for something you said, they are responding to their own followers, not yours, so trolls quickly lose interest.
“Anything that is useful to both dissidents in Iran and Martha Stewart has a lot going for it; Twitter has more raw capability for users than anything since e-mail,” said Clay Shirky, who wrote “Here Comes Everybody,” a book about social media. “It will be hard to wait out Twitter because it is lightweight, endlessly useful and gets better as more people use it. Brands are using it, institutions are using it, and it is becoming a place where a lot of important conversations are being held.”
Twitter helps define what is important by what Mr. Shirky has called “algorithmic authority,” meaning that if all kinds of people are pointing at the same thing at the same instant, it must be a pretty big deal.
Beyond the throbbing networked intelligence, there is the possibility of practical magic. Twitter can tell you what kind of netbook you should buy for your wife for Christmas — thanks Twitter! — or call you out when you complain about the long lines it took to buy it, as a tweeter on behalf of the electronics store B & H did when I shared the experience on my Blackberry while in line. I have found transcendent tacos at a car wash in San Antonio, rediscovered a brand of reporter’s notepad I adore, uncovered sources for stories, all just by typing a query into Twitter.
All those riches do not come at zero cost: If you think e-mail and surfing can make time disappear, wait until you get ahold of Twitter, or more likely, it gets ahold of you. There is always something more interesting on Twitter than whatever you happen to be working on.
But in the right circumstance, Twitter can flex some big muscles. Think of last weekend, a heavy travel period marked by a terrorist incident on Friday. As news outlets were scrambling to understand the implications for travelers on Saturday morning, Twitter began lighting up with reports of new security initiatives, including one from @CharleneLi, a consultant who tweeted from the Montreal airport at about 7:30 a.m.: “New security rules for int’l flights into US. 1 bag, no electronics the ENTIRE flight, no getting up last hour of flight.”
It was far from the whole story and getting ahead of the news by some hours would seem like no big deal, but imagine you or someone you loved was flying later that same day: Twitter might seem very useful.
Twitter’s growing informational hegemony is not assured. There have been serious outages in recent weeks, leading many business and government users to wonder about the stability of the platform. And this being the Web, many smart folks are plotting ways to turn Twitter into so much pixilated mist. But I don’t think so. I can go anywhere I want on the Web, but there is no guarantee that my Twitter gang will come with me. I may have quite a few followers, but that doesn’t make me Moses.
David Carr is a reporter for the culture section of The New York Times and the Media Equation columnist for the business section. He tweets at http://twitter.com/carr2n, where his character emerges in 140 characters.
All homes are new construction. 3 bedroom and 2 bath. Located in Creekside Village in Berea, KY. Just minutes away from I-75. Price below appraisal.
Please contact Lesha Hays: Mobile-859-626-2497 Office-859-986-8663 Email- leshahays@earthlink.netWhen comparing August to July, pending home sales slipped but less than market forecasts. Economists expected Pending Home Sales to decrease month-over-month by -1.8%. The actual number was a little better at -1.2%. Hurricane Irene, which battered the Northeast at the end of the month, was likely a factor in the decline.
Three of four regions throughout the United States saw declines in the number of contracts to purchase previously owned homes. The Northeast region experienced the largest loss of 5.8 percent as a result of significant disruption by Hurricane Irene, according to NAR chief economist Lawrence Yun. Meanwhile, sales in Midwest and West also fell 3.7 percent and 2.4 percent, respectively. In contrast, a 2.6 percent gain in the South helped reduce the total loss of pending home sales in the month.
3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, ranch, with tile, hardwood, ceiling fans, and complete kitchen setup. Includes microwave, self clean, range, refrigerator, and dishwasher. Call Lesha Hays 859-986-8663 or 859-626-2497.
MCT)—Struggling to make your mortgage payments? Already in default?
Housing counselors say the most important advice is not to wait to get help. Read the notices and contact your lender or loan servicer to discuss your situation. Putting off these talks will likely make things worse.
And also know your rights:
—You do not have to miss a payment to qualify for the U.S. Home Affordable Modification Program, known as HAMP.
—Under HAMP, a bank is not to proceed with a foreclosure sale until a borrower has been evaluated for HAMP, and if eligible, an offer has been made.
—To learn more about HAMP, go to http://www.makinghomeaffordable.gov/. Housing counselors and lenders can tell you of other programs or payment alternatives.
—Housing counselors are certified to give free advice about finances and are to know what they’re doing, says Greg Sterns, financial education manager at Lighthouse of Oakland County in Pontiac, Michigan, a nonprofit that offers housing and financial counseling.
Sterns said housing counselors also may refer borrowers to other free legal services, as well.
(c) 2011, Detroit Free Press.
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Brick ranch with 3 bedrooms, 2 1/2 bathrooms, fireplace, vaulted ceiling, sercurity system, and an open floor plan. Nice level lot with fenced backyard and deck. $169,900. MLS#38065. Call Lesha 859-626-2497
