Google have announced that there is now a chance to completely customise your webmail inbox.

In the past this has only been possible by using greasemonkey or other javascript themes that only work on Firefox.

To customize your Gmail inbox, go to the Themes tab under Settings. There will be extra themes added over the next couple of days.

As for which theme to choose, I like the “Minimalist” and “notebook” Gmail theme. But the theme that all the ‘geeks’ will blog about is “Terminal”.

Screenshot of Notebook Theme:

A classic book written by Google’r Jeff Veen.

What you have to do to get your copy, either add Sitepoint as a friend on Twitter, or visit Twitaway.com.

You have 12 days from now to download this. Completely gratis.

Ever wondered what the colours around you made you react, or feel . Well, without getting too ‘new age’ colour therapy has been shown to improve your life.

Just by adding a splash of colour to things around you, at home and at work can improve your state of mind and well being.

Walls – Putting up some orange can galvanise your brain. Studies have shown that people are more productive in orange rooms! Its a useful mix of energising red and creative yellow that does it apparently. Will it stop us wasting time on facebook and twitter? We will have to get the paint brushes out to see!

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This Excerpt is from Duct Marketing Blog:
Web people like to talk about clear and smooth businesses or web sites as those that are very simple for the visitor to navigate and experience. There are many places your business can fall down in this regard and all perform a marketing function, for good or bad.

So, here are some common places to look and make sure you are easy.

Are you easy:

• To communicate with – voicemail, email, contact us page, IM, click to call,
• To understand – narrowly defined market, simple core message of value
• To listen to – two or three well developed presentations on message
• To speak to – ability to listen and advise, know when to say no and thank you
• To network with – think give before get, throw away the score card
• To trust – consistency and content, be the authentic you, educate – don’t sell
• To buy from – smooth transaction, delivery, follow-up
• To work with – engaging experience, results driven
• To refer – tools that teach how to refer, give partners way to refer – workshops

This applies to you, whether just starting out or have been going for a few years – take a look at each point to see what you think you score highly for and those that you don’t.

People in business will lose a percentage of that business however successful they are, however good their service is, and however good their products are.

Changes in market trends are the main cause.. Today the current market trend being rumours around the big ‘R’ for recession.

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We’ve returned from our annual weightwatchers trip. Where we (my future wife and I) (try to) shed a few pounds, we decided to use our bikes this year.

The plan: To cycle the Sustrans West Country way bike route from Bristol to Padstow. A 300 mile part traffic free route which leads us from Bristol to the quiet and country lanes of Cornwall.

We camped throughout the journey, apart from our night on Exmoor where where had the luxury of a B&B in Dulverton.

The trip took us 6 days from start to finish, covering 3 sets of interesting hills – The Quantocks, Somerset. The Exmoor National Park, Devon, and various Cornwall hilly bits.

We were covering about 50 miles a day on average, and carrying around 80 litre capacity clothing, food and camping equipment.

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Psst, use this code to get a massive £200 off this years FOWA in London this October.