News

Responding to your Needs

It's been a hectic six months since we undertook our member survey, working through the many excellent suggestions that we received. The result is several improvements - and the best part is that they are all part of the service, no extra costs, just a better product to record your life story.

What's new?

The most significant change is the Personal Events section. We have completely updated this area by introducing categories and adding suggestions for what to write about. Previously, all your personal events were stored together and you could only view them by year. Now you can organize your personal events in categories such as education, employment, holidays and sports. This makes it much easier to keep your stories in order and it helps to remember what you have done. We have incorporated a search facility so you can easily find stories that you have written and we have also included lists of prompts for each category so if you get stuck for an idea you can look at the suggestions.

When you next sign-in, your existing Personal Events will be filed under 'Miscellaneous'. It is very simple to re-file them under different categories - simply click on the Details button next to the event and select the appropriate category from the drop-down box.

Flash-backs

One observation that we made from the survey is that everybody is very busy. Many members told us that they would like to use the software more often but finding time was a problem and some members even told us that they sometimes forget to use the site. To help, we have come up with an automatic email service called Life of Mine Flash-backs. These weekly email reminders are full of interesting events from your lifetime - and we have made it very easy to add Flash-back events to your story. Simply click on the email link, sign-in and the event will automatically be added to your story. We hope the Flash-backs will be just the encouragement you need to write a little bit of your story once a week. Before you know it you will be ready to publish!

Birthdays

What happened on your birthday? We have installed a fun application on the Life of Mine home page. You can find out what happened on your birthday and during the year you were born. You can type in your friends' birth dates and email the results to them for a birthday message! Anyone can use it free of charge.

Links Page

We have a new links page that we would like some help with. We would like to exchange links with other quality websites that you enjoy visiting. If you have some favorite sites that you would like to share with other members, please let us know. Simply email the web address to bruce@lifeofmine.com

If you belong to any organisations that have websites we would be delighted for them to link to our website too.

Country Flags

Some members asked us to identify which events in the database were 'world' events and which ones were 'local'. Now, when you view database items you will see a small globe next to world events and a small flag next to local ones.

The local flag will change, depending on where you have lived. For example, if you were living in the U.K. in 1972, and you have recorded your address in the My Homes section, you will see a small Union Jack flag next to an event about a coal miners strike (maybe you will remember the strike that caused widespread electricity blackouts across Britain in 1972). Adding the event to your Life Story is just as easy as before - a single click and it will be included. And, of course, you can still write about your memories of that event to record your own personal experience.

The globe and flags will be visible whenever you view the event database - either by year, by category or searching.