Green Tips: Appliances & Electronics
Written by Bryan on July 28th, 2009The US Department of Energy has a fantastic list of ways you can save energy by changing how you use your appliances and electronics.
The easiest thing for you to do is to unplug electronic devices you aren’t using. Standby power, also known as “phantom load” is the energy that is used by your devices when they are apparently turned off. Check out this Wikipedia entry for more information on standby power. Some common examples are your VCR, DVD player, coffee maker, and home computer.
If you are not using these items, it is recommended that you unplug them to prevent from unintentional energy usage. You’ll be doing yourself and the Earth a favor.
Tips on going Green
Written by Bryan on July 27th, 2009
The Green Guide is a fantastic website \ magazine published by National Geographic which focuses on how to live a green life.
With guides to purchasing green goods, such as insect repellent, sunscreen, plastic containers, automobiles, homes and vacations, The Green Guide
will provide you with a wealth of Ecofriendly information.
Where there is certainly no shortage of tips for going green, National Geographic has put together a nice list of Fast Facts for us to get our green on.
The Staga Network now accepts OpenID
Written by Bryan on July 21st, 2009
Over the past couple of months I have spent alot of time building a testing a new login system here on The Staga Network that allows you to login with your Google, Yahoo!, AOL, or Facebook accounts.
Why is this so great? Because now you do not have to remember yet another username and password. In the future I plan to support additional accounts such as Microsoft Live, MySpace ID, and basic OpenID.
A number of other minor bugs have been fixed in this release and there is more to come.
Share your Staga Network activity with your Facebook friends
Written by Bryan on April 10th, 2009Today I launched a few new cool features, but the coolest is the ability to send your Staga Network activity to your Facebook profile and share it with your friends. This helps The Staga Network grow and it increases the visibility of your posts too. Equally important is the ability to easily invite your Facebook friends to also join The Staga Network.
Also added in this release are RSS feeds for Member profiles, showing all member activity. Some pages have been redesigned and optimized for the best user experience based on feedback from Staga Network Members.
The Staga Network is now harnessing the power of Twitter to publish activity through our Twitter stream: http://twitter.com/TheStagaNetwork
I hope these few new features help make The Staga Network even better!
New updates pushed out
Written by Bryan on January 27th, 2009It has been a while since I have blogged about The Staga Network, but there are a bunch of new features that are worth mentioning here.
First and foremost, I have spent a lot of time working on improving the performance of the website in general. Right now, the site is blazing fast and I plan to keep it that way.
Some of the new features that I have added to The Staga Network are:
- a new “My Home” page that displays an activity stream of everything going on in your Communities. It also lists all of your friends’ activities as well. These activity streams will keep you up to date with new posts, new members, profile updates, and let you know when your posts have any comments.
- RSS feeds for all Communities so you can load the feed into your favorite feed reader and keep up to date with everything that is going on in your Community.
- an updated Notification system that will alert you via Email when specific actions occur on the website, such as when someone requests you as a friend, or when someone comments on your posts or profile.
- the ability to upload a custom Profile photo, and re-size it on the fly.
- a Remember Me option so that you do not have to log in every time you come to the site - we’ll remember you!
- updated Member Profile pages that show your most recent posts and allow other members to leave comments on your Profile.
In addition to the features listed above, I have also tweaked a ton of things to make your experience better, but as always I will continue to make it even better than it is today.
Thanks for checking out The Staga Network, and please help us grow by spreading the word to your friends, family, neighbors, and anyone else you could think of!
We Are Seeking Sponsorship
Written by Bryan on July 2nd, 2008The Staga Network is currently seeking endorsements, sponsorships and possibly advertising deals.
If you or your company would like to sponsor us in any way, please contact me and let me know what you would like to do. I would like to place your logo and\or link on our home page as a way of thanking you for your sponsorship.
Your contribution will be used to help in my efforts to advertise The Staga Network, in hopes of driving more traffic to the site. This ultimately will help us gain more members which will make the Communities more productive, and help the environment.
I am currently only accepting offers from companies with a clear Green initiative.
2.0 Release
Written by Bryan on June 15th, 2008After more than an entire year of development, I am proud to publicly release version 2.0 of The Staga Network!
I have completely recreated The Staga Network from scratch to ensure a quick and smooth experience for all of The Staga Network’s members. This gave me the opportunity to add many new features while improving some of the existing ones.
For those of you who do not know what The Staga Network is, here is a little information:
The Staga Network is an online community that allows you to connect with the people in your neighborhood for the purpose of swapping and trading items with one another. It is a great opportunity to get rid of the things you no longer use, while benefiting someone else by giving it to them for free. As a byproduct of this concept, you will improve the environment and make the Earth a better place by eliminating unnecessary trash.
For the new release, I have added a number of features that are designed to help make The Staga Network a better community. Some of those new features are:
- a Feedback link located on every page, making it easier than ever to let us know what you think about the website. You can use this to submit bug reports, make suggestions, or anything you can think of.
- ability to import your address book from several different e-mail services when you Invite your family and friends. This makes it easier than ever to spread the word to everyone you know!
- friends lists so you can stay up to date on your favorite members’ activity. You’ll always know immediately when that person has something to give away.
- the ability to create a member profile for yourself, and view other members’ profiles as well. In addition to displaying a customized “About Me” section, member profiles show all of a member’s recent activity, their friends list, communities they belong to, and allow for other members to leave comments on their profile.
- a revamped messaging system which now allows you to send messages to other members from almost any page on the site.
Additionally, many changes were made behind the scenes to speed up The Staga Network so the pages load quicker, etc.
I hope that all of these changes and fixes help make The Staga Network a better place, and like always, I ask that you help spread the word to your family & friends so that we may continue to grow.
Upcoming Changes
Written by Bryan on April 4th, 2008If you haven’t noticed, it has been a long, long time since The Staga Network received any changes or upgrades.
I have been spending the last few months giving the website a complete overhaul. Essentially rewriting the code from scratch has allowed me to pinpoint all of the little bugs that have surfaced in the past and eliminate them for good.
I have also been able to add some extra features such as…
- Friends lists
- Community search
- A number of page re-designs
- More control over your posts
- A new media manager for your post pictures
- A robust messaging system
- A more aesthetically pleasing site design
- A faster experience
- A feedback system so you can tell me what needs fixing
- Member profiles
- A set of slick special effects
I will be posting some screen shots of the new features soon and I will release the new website very very soon - I am trying to keep on schedule with a May 2008 release date.