IRS changes for 2012 and your PayPal account

Do you get payments from PayPal? If you do, the IRS has your number. That number being the amount of money you received from PayPal. What does this mean for you? If you are not subject to US taxes, it doesn't mean anything. If you do have to fill out a US federal tax return, then this means that the US government knows how much you received from PayPal and may be upset if you don't pay your taxes.

Who has to pay US taxes?
For individuals, if you are not a US citizen and did not live or conduct business in the US, then you don't pay US taxes, even if you received income from the US (either directly or through a third party payment processor like PayPal). The situation is similar for companies. If your company has no presence in the US, it typically is not subject to US taxes. If you don't fit into these categories, then you have to pay attention to US tax laws and regulations.

What's changed for 2011?
Starting in 2011, third-party payment providers like PayPal (as well as credit and debit card payment processors) were required to report to the IRS payments made to individuals and businesses.

How is this different from before?
The only difference is in who reports payments to the IRS. For example, if you ran a web site and had some kind of affiliate or advertising relationship with some company, and that company paid you using PayPal, that company may have been required to send you an IRS form (typically a 1099-MISC form) that summarized your total received payments from the previous year. Now, that company doesn't have to send you any IRS summary form, PayPal would do that now.

In previous years, the company that sent you payment using PayPal was typically required to both report those payments to the IRS, and send you a 1099 form if the total payments in the previous year was more than $600. Now, that company is no longer required to send that information to you or to the IRS.

How does this affect you?
There will be no change if you or your business are not subject to US taxes. For everyone else, there will be no change if you have always followed appropriate IRS regulations for reporting income and expenses. If you are subject to US taxes, and have not reported income in the past, then the only change is that PayPal will tell the IRS how much you were sent, and it will be more likely that you will get penalized by the IRS for not reporting your income.

What do you have to do?
If you are subject to the new reporting requirements, your payment processor (PayPal, Google Checkout, etc.) will contact you and request information such as your name and tax identification number. If you don't provide this information, that processor may withhold some of your payment for tax purposes. If you do provided all the required information, you may be sent an IRS form 1099-K that summarizes your payments that you received from that processor.

How will this affect your taxes?
If you had done proper accounting and reporting of your income and expenses before, then this new reporting requirement won't change your taxes at all. If you have not been reporting your income in the past, then you may have to pay more taxes (or even fines for under reporting income). If you have not taken the time to treat your activity as a business, now would be a good time to start. If you are self employed or run a small business, you may want to check out some of the appropriate IRS resources. If you are in a large business and are responsible for dealing with accounting and tax issues, then you should review your procedures to make sure that this change in the IRS rules has been addressed.

Other Resources
IRS Third Party Reporting Information Center
IRS Small Business and Self-Employed Tax Center

Disclaimer: This article contains general information about US tax laws and regulations and does not constitute legal, tax, or professional advice. If you have questions about these issues, please seek out the services of appropriate professionals or information from authoritative sources.

How to become an ebook publisher without spending money

Late last year, I published an article about how to read Kindle Books without buying a Kindle. The article was written with a larger goal in mind, to put you on a path to becoming an ebook publisher, creating books and other documents that can be read on Kindles, iPads, iPhones, personal computers, and just about any other ebook reader or personal computing device.

If one or more of the following applies to you, then this article has a lot to offer to you:

• You have written a traditional book, and are thinking about publishing it as an ebook.
  
  
• You are thinking about publishing a new book, and think that starting with an ebook would be quicker and cheaper.
  
  
• You have a web site, blog, or podcast and you want to offer your audience downloadable documents.
  
  
• Kindles and ebooks are the new hot thing and you want to get in on the action.

All of these things were true for me, and I certainly had the desire to get something out the door and into the hands of an audience. However, I had a couple of obstacles between me and an ebook:

1. I barely knew anything about ebooks other than they existed.
   
   
2. I didn't feel like spending a lot of time, or much money, learning how to publish an ebook

I'll spare you the middle of the story and go straight to the end. If you want to learn about the ebook production process, even if you don't want to write an ebook yourself, go to Smashwords.com and sign up for their free service. They will take you by the hand and show you how to get your book properly formatted, and ready for sale.

If you take the next step and actually create a book (it doesn't have to be either very good or very long, so go ahead and put something together), give lots of copies to friends, relatives, or anyone else who will give you some feedback about it.

After you get some feedback and edit or even rewrite sections of the book, go ahead and put it on sale. If you use the Smashwords distribution system, you can even give it away for free, and have Smashwords track your downloads. The great thing about Smashwords is that they turn your book into a version suitable for every kind of ebook reader. They will even turn it into a PDF document.

At AirSafe Media, I took one previously published book and turned it into an ebook, and created two other ebooks in a matter of days. One was based on existing online articles, and a second based on a training manual I made for another purpose. All three are available for free download, and I made them available as a PDF file and in versions that could be read in a Kindle, iPad, or in an ereader or smartphone.

If you want to go a step further, after you become familiar with the Smashwords process for creating ebooks, check out the the free book Publish on Amazon Kindle with Kindle Direct Publishing from Amazon. If you have something is good enough to sell, go ahead and try Amazon. The worst thing that could happen is that you will make some money.

Speaking of money, I paid nothing to use the Smashwords system, and nothing to use Amazon Direct Publishing. You have no excuses, go publish something.

Resources
Smashwords Author page for Todd Curtis
Amazon.com Author page for Todd Curtis

Podcasting production book from AirSafe.com

If you create or manage a web site, blog, Facebook page, or other online resource, if you are in the business of increasing traffic, enhancing search engine results, or serving a specific audience, one way to do so is by using podcasts. Whether it is the classic audio only podcast distributed on your web site, or a video podcast that you distribute on a video sharing site like YouTube, if you want the podcast to be successful, you have to be able to create many episodes over a long period of time.

AirSafe.com has produced the Conversation at AirSafe.com podcast since 2006, and last year created an ebook ,The AirSafe.com Podcasting Manual, that laid out a systematic production process that makes it easier for an individual or an organization to sustain a podcast over the long run.

What's in the book?
Below is the table of contents of the book:

CHAPTER 1: Introduction to Podcasting
CHAPTER 2: The Grand Plan for Your Podcast
CHAPTER 3: What's Your Mission?
CHAPTER 4: Who’s on Your Team?
CHAPTER 5: Leadership
CHAPTER 6: Money and Other Resources
CHAPTER 7: Communications
CHAPTER 8: Planning, Production, and Distribution Systems
CHAPTER 9: Legal Issues
CHAPTER 10: The Podcast
CHAPTER 11: The First Airsafe.com Podcast
CHAPTER 12: The Video Version of the Podcast
CHAPTER 13: Example of a Podcast Plan for a School
APPENDIX 1: Downloading and Using Audacity
APPENDIX 2: Example Podcast Episode Script

If this looks interesting, check it out one of the free download options. Feel free to buy it on Amazon as well.

You can download a PDF file, or a version that is compatible with one of the popular ebook reading formats:

PDF
MOBI (Kindle)
EPUB (Nook, iPad, iPhone, and others)
Purchase Amazon Kindle edition

How to read Kindle books without buying a Kindle

The Kindle ebook reader is a lovely device that some people love. However that love comes at a price. The cheapest version cost less than $100, and if you buy one, you have to put up with the hassles of learning how to use it, keeping track of, and maintaining it.

You can avoid the expense and hassle of buying a device by downloading a free Kindle application that will let you use your computer, tablet, or smart phone to read Kindle books.

Why is all this good stuff free?
Amazon.com, the company behind the Kindle, isn't in the charity business. While the Kindle devices generate revenue, over the long term they will make most of their money through the paid content, including books, that can be displayed on the Kindle device or on one of the free Kindle apps you can download.

How do I get this free Kindle App?
Simply go to Amazon.com at http://www.amazon.com/gp/kindle/kcp and download the appropriate Kindle app for your device. You can get an app for the following devices:

- Windows PC
- Mac PC
- iPhone
- iPad
- Android
- Blackberry
- Windows Phone 7

Once the download is finished, you can use your Amazon.com account to log into the online Kindle store to either buy content or to download free content. You don't have to have a Amazon.com account to read books and use other content, there are several advantages. One of the biggest ones is that you can download a sample of a book and evaluate it before you decide if you want to buy it.

Magic Kindle Powers
Since the Kindle app is free, you can download it for every device that you have. There are two ways that Amazon makes this a convenient option. First, if when you purchase a book, you can download it and read it on every device where you have a Kindle app. Second, if you make notes or bookmarks in a book on one device, when you open up the book on another device, all the notes and bookmarks transfer as well.

Try these free books
You don't have to get your books from Amazon. You can read .mobi format ebook file on your Kindle reader. Check out these two free ebooks from AirSafe.com's partner Speedbrake Publishing.

Parenting and the Internet
The AirSafe.com Podcasting Manual

5 ways to use Google Docs to run your business

Google Docs has three great things going for it: it's free, it keeps getting improved, and it is flexible. The first advantage is obvious, and the other two are well illustrated in a short video from Sharon Vaknin of CNET News. You may also know her from Geek and the City

The following are the key points about Google Docs you can pick up from the video:

1. Easy uploading: You can upload files of almost any format to Google Docs, and also drag and drop files from your hard drive to the Docs home page. You can also upload an entire folder (like your My Documents), into Google Docs, and it would keep your folder and subfolder organization intact.

2. Insert photos directly into a document: You can insert a photo into a document by dragging and dropping files from your hard drive or from the web.

3. Add comments: This is a great option if you are collaborating with someone on a document. You can highlight a block of text, add a comment, and that comment, along with the name of the person who wrote the comment, will appear in the sidebar, where other collaborators can reply to that comment. You can even send the comment to a specific collaborator with a Twitter-like capability by typing "@" followed by the person'sname. If you move the highlighted text, the comments will move with it.

4. Easy file backup: With a few keystrokes, you can download all of your Google Doc files into your hard drive, and even specify what kind of format you want to use. For example, you can save a document file either as a Word file or an OpenOffice file.

5. Helpful Google Rappers: While not technically a part of Google Docs, you can go to YouTube to see Google employee rapping about how to use the help functions in Google Docs.

What to get when starting a new online effort

If you are thinking about creating a new online presence, and intend to create something that would be attractive to a wide audience, it usually helps to plan it so that people can relate to what you are doing in several different ways. Doing just a web site, or just a podcast, or just a Facebook page isn't enough. With a little bit of planning, you should be able to get something useful up and running in a day or less.

What to add and how quickly?
Ideally, you would have all your content created and ready to go on day one, and a very clear idea of what you want to do online. Realistically, you may have only some of the content created, and only a vague idea of where you will end up even a few weeks down the road. My suggestion is to prioritize what you do by how important it will be to you later. A few years ago, that meant getting a domain name. Today, you probably would still need a domain name, or at least a user name or other identifier that would end up in the URL of services like YouTube and Twitter.

Case study - MoneyBahn.com
My latest project was creating a web site promoting financial education and investment services. Based on my experience with the airline safety site AirSafe.com, I understood that to get and keep an audience's attention and to attract traffic, it helped to have several different elements to an online effort, including widely used online resources like web sites to resources like Twitter and Facebook that may be used only by a portion of my target audience. While few would likely use every resource, my goal was to have a range of options for someone to choose.

I wanted to start with three new online resources: a web site, a Twitter account, and a YouTube account. I also wanted to pick a domain name that could also incorporated in the user name of the Twitter account and the URL of the YouTube account. After a short search, I found that MoneyBahn.com was available for a domain name, so I went ahead and had the site created. I then created a new Twitter account and YouTube account with MoneyBahn as the user name.

With these key elements in place, I was assured that the most likely resources I would use to promote the new web site (Twitter and YouTube) would have URLs that would include the 'MoneyBahn" portion of the web sites domain name. With these new elements in place, I could not concentrate on creating more content. To see how that is shaping up, you may want to visit the main site at MoneyBahn.com, or sites Twitter account and Facebook page.

Restricting Blogger links to the home page

For those of you who have sites on Blogger, one of the great advantages is that you don't have to know HTML or any other programming language to have a site up and running in minutes. While you can use Blogger-supplied code (called gadgets) to add or subtract extra content into a sidebar like blogrolls, polls, or a search box, you don't usually have any options when it comes to where those widgets will be seen. Typically, once a Blogger gadget is added, you will see the content of that Gadget
in the sidebar of every page on the site.

If you have a handful of links that you only want on the home page, one option is to use the HTML/Javascript gadget (my favorite for adding plain text links) and to change how that gadget operates so that it only shows up on the home page. This involves changing the template that controls the look and feel of the site. By adding a couple of lines of code, you can change this gadget so that it is only visible on the home page.

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Note:If you haven't done any kind of web site or blog coding before using HTML, and feel unsure about changing the code, either find someone who can do it for you or practice this on either one of your inactive Blogger sites or on a site that you put together for testing changes like this.

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The following instructions are taking from an article on the Blogger Tricks site:

• Sign into Blogger dashboard and click on the Design link for your blog, click on the Add a Gadget on your blog's layout, and then select the type of gadget you need (for example HTML/Javascript). Add the content that you want, and save your changes.
  
  
• Next, you have to add a small piece of code to that gadget so that your content only displays in the Homepage. Just clcik to Edit HTML and then select the box next to 'Expand Widget Templates'. Now would also be a good time to save the template just in case.
  
  
• Find the HTML/Javascript gadget, which should start with code that looks like <b:widget id='HTML1' locked='false' title='' type='HTML>
  
  
• Just below that line of code, You should see a "b:includable" tag that looks like <b:includable id='main'>
  
  
• Under that line, add the following: <b:if cond='data:blog.url == data:blog.homepageUrl'>
  
  
• Just before the line </b:includable> tag, add the line </b:if> to close the "if" statement.
  
  
• Save your template and test your blog. If everything went well, you should only see that gadget on the home page.

The same Blogger Tricks article also shows you how to do this for other types of gadgets, and also how to do this so that the gadget content shows up everywhere except the home page.