Things are Changing Around Here in 2024

 

The Internet is becoming more and more of an abyss, what with social media blurring the edges of every website we visit and an assumption that everyone has fabulously fast broadband and mobile phones that can juggle a thousand photos, videos and applications. Sadly, this is not the case for everyone. Some of us live within the small percentage of UK to where such luxuries have not yet arrived. Blogging seems to have become obscured by vlogging and while viewer numbers on our own YouTube channel reflect no need for it to be there, it is still something that I want to do, There are no frills attached, not even voiceovers, just tiny fragments of videos that give our viewers the opportunity to see what we see while we are here. Getting the word out about anything is beyond affordability to the likes of us, despite taking part in local wildlife events and such like.

So here we are, trying to get back into blogging but now from the off-grid huts that sit amidst the wilderness that is Frugaldom. I am relying on an inexpensive 100w solar panel connected to a secondhand leisure battery to power the laptop and I access the internet by tethering the laptop to a mobile phone. This only work if I perch the phone on the edge of the camping stove. Granted, the view from the office window is fabulous on a clear day - fields, forest, Vincent Van Goat calling from his enclosure, rescue ponies frolicking around their track in whatever the weather and all against the backdrop of the Galloway Hills. Not bad, in my book. But that doesn't pay the bills nor does it put food on the table, feed in the buckets or hay in the nets.

AIRES AND SPACES

At just £5 for an overnight stop and a licence that allows for up to five campervans at a time, we have the potential to generate some income. Our yard is fairly level, secluded, enclosed and secure but lends itself better to hosting three motorhomes up to 7.5m so that is the number I am working with for now. We are off the beaten track bu only 4 miles from the main A75, depending on which route you take. We are not on a through road, nor even on a road to anywhere other than a wind farm and forest so only the farmer, forestry folks and windfarm maintenance people pass our gate, plus a few dog walkers who drive their dogs up to the windfarm. Again, this does not lend itself to overnight stops, especially as all around us are alernatives to paying for parking. But wait... could there be a small percentage of campervanners who may just be looking for a safe, secure hideaway to escape the norm? Or might there be the occasional individuals looking to pay £25 per night to have the yard to themselves? Even better!

With 5 spaces at £5 per space, our yard has the potential to generate an absolute maximum aire income of  £9,125 (less transaction fees) per year, but the reality is far different from that. Based on 3 campervans, the income potential is £5,475. Again, the reality is far from actual turnover as the possibulity of having 3 campers in every day of the year is just fantasy. Where we are right now, we are lucky to see an average 1 campervan a month. No point glossing over this fact. I am forever reading comments on socal media about how so many want to pay so little for so much and this is one of the reasons I feel we should move on from offering secure parking and look at alternatives. We are a very quirky project, not your normal run-of-the-mill campsite. We are an aire - a term I had never encountered before opening our yard to the land of campervanners and motorhomers. Indeed, I have never spent a night in either - my preference is hutting in the countryside, surrounded by famiiar landscapes and our regular visits from the badgers, pine marten, fox and yes, even the adders, when the sun decides to shine. 

We accept PayPal payments to Frugaldom either direct via the QR code posted at the gate or by email to frugaldom@gmail.com but we also use honesty and donation boxes for those who prefer to pay cash. On occasion, we will barter for goods, services or a little bit of help from visiting campervanners. It all helps when running a voluntary project with no regular source of income generation on site. So what is our niche?

HUTS AND WILDLIFE

Most nights, we are visited by pine marten, badgers and fox. As members of our regular support group, which costs from as little as £5 per month, you can visit anytime and watch for the wildlife. 

Bring some peanuts and you're sure to attract some animal attention, even if it is just a visit from Vincent Van Goat, who is one of our rescued residents living at the Frugaldom sanctuary.

We are special, we are quirky, we are affordable, we are niche, we are at Frugaldom. We will hold the ampervan aire open until the end of the year then assess the situation from there.

#Win with NYK - What Type of Savvy Shopper are You?

What Type of Savvy Shopper are you and what are 'Freedom Rewards'?

I’m a Bargain Hunter Gatherer and proud of it!

Frugaldom is giving you the chance to learn about Freedom Rewards while taking a short quiz to determine what type of savvy shopper you are, plus the chance to win £60 of Amazon vouchers, courtesy of our sponsors at Barclaycard. 

A new consumer study carried out by Barclaycard - which processes nearly half of all card transactions in the UK – together with consumer experts at Brunel University, shows that the recent economic climate has made a lasting impact on how we approach shopping and saving money. Bagging a bargain goes far beyond just saving cash, people now place far greater value on the emotional investment of smart spending, giving rise to our four new modern shopping 'tribes'.

•  The Bargain Hunter Gatherer
•  The High Street Pounder
•  The Screen Saver 
•  The Profit Prophet

I took the quiz and am pleasantly surprised at how accurate the results are! Now it’s your turn to see what you think and share your views. An extra £60 to spend is a much appreciated opportunity and, thanks to our sponsors, we have just that!

 

Take part in the quiz here

Edited in: Results of the free draw can be found here

(Original image URL: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mukumbura/4052671706/)

Food Prices Past, Present and Future

Food Prices Past, Present and Future

Having kept notes, I thought you might be interested in seeing my price comparisons. The average price increase in foodstuffs since 1999 to 2013, when comparing my 'shopping list' of cheapest available items, amounts to almost exactly 100% But of course this only holds true if you have easy, cost-free access to a modern, all singing, all dancing supermarket…

… But what does this mean in real terms to the supermarket shoppers of today? We keep on ploughing our energy, time and money into making ends meet, while feeding the household and saving what we can, in the hope that the sun shines and we don't have to afford too many rainy days. - Read more

Frugal Money Making Ideas

How to recycle games consoles, DVDs, CDs, games, books and even clothing for cash. I am looking for an easy option that doesn't involve travelling, waiting in for callers or listing in the online auctions - I want simple convenience and the ability to de-clutter or recycle for cash straight from home.  De-cluttering and Recycling for Cash  The process looks simple enough even for a technophobe like me. You just enter the make and model of the gadget or barcode of the DVD, CD or Game that you want to sell and click for an instant offer price. There are a few terms and conditions that need to be met but these seem to be basic common sense, so nothing too complicated. Read More here

Have You Got a Frugal EEK?

Frugaldom's 'Everything Else Kitty'.

As you know, my annual household budget challenge for all things household is £4,000, but I also have a very interesting revolving budget challenge known as my 'EEK' - the 'Everything Else Kitty'.

 

The household budget includes groceries, toiletries, laundry and cleaning products, electricity, heating, clothing, utilities bills and the general needs of a frugal household, excluding Council Tax, which is simply non-negotiable and has to be paid. We have no rent or mortgage, we live in the fixy-up while it's being, err... fixy-upped.

 

The EEK literally needs to account for everything else - including feeding the livestock that are part of the microholding project (It's a bit like smallholding but on a much smaller scale) and creating that microholding in the first place.

 

Everything Else Kitty has some huge responsibilities - if I want a holiday, the money has to come from somewhere. Entertainment and socialising costs cash, so that has to come from somewhere. That somewhere can be from a variety of sources - selling surplus eggs, cash back, vouchers, gifts, refunds, surplus plant sales or even Moneysupermarket.com when they invite you to take part in one of their competitions. I do love to grasp any opportunities that come my way.

 

 

 

So, when the opportunity arose to take part in the Charcoal Challenge, I leapt at it! The first thing I had to do was look at what was or wasn't already available - plenty of charcoal but we've no barbecue! It's on the list of 'things to make'. 

 

"Show us how you’d throw the ultimate summer barbecue for £50!" they said. "Show us how creative you can be!" And, lest we forget, there's a prize of £250 cash to be won by one of the lucky bloggers taking part in this challenge!

 

My £50 has been received and is now in the safekeeping of 'Everything Else Kitty', all barring £5.85 + £2.80 delivery that I have just spent buying a very frugal barbecue!

Now all I need to do is get planning the best BBQ ever on the remaining budget of £41.35 and make sure there's something extra special about it. That takes care of July's socialising!

Today is a great day! Not only am I getting the fun of planning a frugal (read that as paid for by

someone else) BBQ party, but the new poly tunnel arrived yesterday and has now been built! It's looking great and the temperature inside it is definitely tropical.

A seat and a refreshing drink of lemon balm tea whilst nibbling on freshly picked strawberries provided suitable reminder that life in Frugaldom is good. Then the postman arrived!

My mini tunnels and mini potting greenhouses are here! (See earlier post for details and get later posts for updates).

Frugal living means making hay while the sun shines, so it's blackcurrant picking for me this afternoon before I can begin playing with any of my new toys! The 'Everything Else Kitty' won't feed itself and it has been getting slightly over-worked recently and I really don't want to have to dip into the household budget for anything garden-related. Bad enough I had my frugal trip up Ben Nevis in May, never mind overspend on plastic! ;)


You can follow the frugal living challenge updates on Twitter @Frugaldom or on Facebook at www.facebook.com/NYKMedia There are also forums where you are free to join and participate in any of the challenges.

A Look Back Over the Frugal Years

2013 is LOOMING LARGE! 

I can't believe how quickly time is marching on and that we're a mere four days from December 2012! Preparing for 2013 seems a bit 'pie in the sky', yet here we are... pies, shortbread, clootie dumplings and anything else you can think of begging to be baked or boiled!

Everyone's talking in Christmas-speak, Yule-speak and winter festivities-speak, so it's high time that I got to work on the new Frugaldom moneymaking challenge, before drifting off into fluffy-cloud-land to dream of Santa, roaring log fires, hot chocolate and marshmallows.

As most people know, a frugal lifestyle allows little in the budget for anything outside the cost of living, especially while trying to renovate an 1805 cottage that sucks every breath of warmth from you as soon as you walk in the door. 'Sausage dog' draught excluders, fleece curtain linings, winter woolies and extra quilts are all at the ready, having been rudely awakened from their summer slumbers. But that won't halt the ever-increasing cost of living. No way.

Beating inflation is about staying ahead of the game and, for those of us who are self-employed, that means one of two things... increasing the income or reducing the overheads. Well my overheads are as close to zero as I can possibly bring them without imposing hypothermia or malnutrition on anyone who ventures near, so that leaves income.

Frugal living means frugal working, so another new challenge has been launched for 2013. We've been doing these for years. Nobody has ever got rich yet, but they are such immense fun that it would be sad to stop trying now.

The premise is that you 'invest' a fixed amount, say £10, and then work towards growing your money to show profit. This year, I invested in some egg cartons and began selling frugal gourmet quail eggs. A fellow frugaler developed her skills in making jewellery items, while another bought fabric and sold cushion-sized squares.

It's amazing how much fun you can have with £10 but, for 2013, we are upping the stakes to a whopping £50! The challenge launched recently during Gobal Entrepreneurship Week with one frugaler setting up a secondhand clothes business, catering for larger ladies, while another is looking into room rental. Me? I have set up 'Clan McGonk' as part of my long-standing eco-arts project.

Eco-art is about creating one thing from another using, wherever possibe, what would otherwise be treated as surplus to requirement.

With this in mind, I thought it would be rather fun to recap on some of the past challenges, products and ideas. For a start, it may tempt a few of you to consider joining our 2013 challenge

My garden logman bird feeder was built from off cuts left by the treefeller when a neighbour had a conifer felled in her garden last year.

'Cash cow', along with several other characters, was made from papier mache. We simply recycled old newspapers and turned them into banks - and all other forms of sealed pots - for yet another savings challenge.

The pebble and shell 'pets', as you can easily see, were made from pebbles and shells. (I think that was the 2005/6 challenge - we've been doing this for some time.) With investment made into tiny 'googly eyes', they, in turn, began finding their way onto everything! We sold some really, really crazy items via eBid.

Does anyone remember any of the other recycled items that Frugaldom produced over the years? What about the famous 'willitfit'? The wooden postal measuring slots were made from offcuts salvaged from a local picture framer. I got all manner of offcuts, mostly thin hardboard of the type used to back prints for framing. Those were great days! The smaller pieces of wood were turned into wooden savings 'bricks' and the bits sliced from the postal slots were made into keyrings. A small investment was made into the rings and hoops for creating the keychains. And then, along came the offcuts from plywood - how fantastic was that? Free plywood and a friend with a fancy shmancy cutting tool that meant we could draw shapes, then he could cut them accordingly.

All manner of creatures appeared on the doorstep, as we turned them into hand-painted planters.

Perhaps the days of larger free offcuts will return, but the recession is surely here to stay - nobody wants to part with free wood nowadays, not when it can go on a stove to help fend off the cold and boil a kettle for a cuppa. So, it's time to move on and attempt to make something from whatever people are finding themselves getting rid of to the bin man. Pity I can't recycle plastics. Hmm...

To hand, I have old clothing, household textiles and shredded paper! With this in mind, plus the fact that sis had the job of creating furry toys for tombola stall prizes, she gave me the idea of how I could adapt a previous project (1999, so few if any of you will remember it!) to bring it online and into production.

My 2013 Frugaleur Challenge is to make recycled furry friends, otherwise known as my clan of McGonks! The initial start-up capital will be invested in such things as website creation, felt, fur, ribbon, little pompoms, big googly eyes and any variety of sewing and replenishing the sewing box with toymaking related items. (I love homemade Christmas presents, don't you?) At the moment, I am unravelling an old jumper to free up some wool for knitting little scarves and crocheting mini-blankets, but I still need to source chunky knitting needles and a crochet hook - soon it will be gonks galore!

During a previous challenge - shell & pebble pets - I managed to grow my investment enough to invest in a lovely new glue gun, so that will help somewhere along the way. During the wood craze, I afforded to invest in a pyrography iron and I already have an office shredder, so that will help make the stuffing! Eco-arts, eco-gonks, eco-fun, who needs a Furby?!

I'm really excited about getting my new frugaleur project off the ground, having already invested in domain names for the new website and dusted down many of the files containing the photos and exploits of my previous character.

Not only will Clan McGonk exist, it will also have its own series of mini ebooks and a selection of collectable furry friends from which to choose. You'll can follow the stories online, take part and generally have some frugal fun. There's even a McGonks page ready to be developed on Facebook - how cool (and free) is that? Now that I come to think about it, perhaps I shouldn't have give away the sewing machine, afterall! I'm going to have to stitch up these furry little critturs by hand.

If you would like to take part in the 2013 challenge, check out the site at www.frugaleur.com and let's get making, baking, creating and crafting for the new year. It's frugal fun all round and we are always interested in trading with like-minded others.

Frugaldom.

Moneymaking Challenges

2013 Frugaleur Challenge

12th - 18th November is Global Entrepreneurship Week so this is a good week to launch our new challenge.

With just over 7 weeks remaining of 2012 I decided it was time to start planning ahead and setting some new challenges for 2013. Times are getting hard, income is at an all time low and spending at an all time high, so I need to look especially hard at redressing this balance before things get out of hand. OK, I've no rent or mortgage to pay now but the truth is, there wouldn't be enough income to cover rent if it had to be paid! Something, somewhere, just isn't adding up correctly.

 

Prices are escalating on everything while the Government has allowed an extra £75 BILLION of new money to be pumped into the system, diluting the value of the pound as it goes. They don't seem to reflect this devaluation when they spout off inflation figures, so we're left wondering how much our pound is going to be worth by the time we reach retirement age, especially if we fail to generate sufficient income to make up all these shortfalls. It's scary stuff!

 

Fired up with enthusiasm, I set to work dusting down old projects that had to be shelved in the past for a variety of reasons, mainly personal circumstances and finances. I began the relaunch of www.scottishwebdirectory.com and hope to gradually fill the pages with everything Scottish and I'm equally hopeful of incorporating a few affiliate links that may cover the costs of running the project, plus earn a bit extra. We're talking pennies here, not pounds... even if the site only generates 35p profit each day, that's enough to cover the cost of annual Class 2 National Insurance Contributions. Of course, it doesn't help when so few people actually want to be linked to a free directory - this part has me baffled! I don't understand why people wouldn't want even a tiny bit of extra promotion for their own businesses, especially when it is offered free. (Comments regarding this peculiar state of affairs are very welcome.)

 

Next up, I need to plan ahead for the frugal living and frugal working challenges that are conducted through the Frugaldom forums. Sometimes I wonder if it's worth it? Nobody actually needs the forum, few read it and even fewer post on it. It's a bit like blogging - there's no real purpose to it other than sharing parts of your daily routine and lifestyle with a handful of strangers in the hope that it entertans, amuses, enlightens or even helps them in some small way. Money isn't the be all and end all of this life. Which brings me back to income.

 

Love or loath money, we all need it, but it isn't always easy to find the enthusiasm, determination or even the confidence to launch yourself headlong into a new business venture or land yourself a well-paid job that you love doing. That's why the frugal working challenges are kept low budget, in an attempt to make them affordable to all.

 

Just as we have frugal living challenges, so, too, we have frugal working challenges, based on the pricipal that anyone can be a entrepreneurs, even when following a frugal lifestyle. Anyone can set themselves up a frugal micro-business with very little cash outlay. Indeed, the 2012 challenge had a maximum start-up budget of just £10. Succeeding in turning a profit and generating a significant income seems to be down to some sort of single-mindedness that tells you to keep going, against all odds. To this end, I'd like to remind you that Sir Richard Branson began his enterprising rise to fame and fortune off the back of, I think, £3 he borrowed from his mum back around 1966. This, he used to pay for the printing of his first 'magazine'.

 

Opportunities to become a frugal entrepreneur, or fugaleur, as I now call them, are all around us, we simply need to grasp the opportunities as soon as we spot them. Had someone set aside £3 back in 1966, their money would now be worth just under £50 (plus whatever interest accrued) so that's the starting figure for the all new 2013 Frugaleur Challenge.

 

If you would like to 'play along', you'll find details at www.frugaleur.com along with a link to the relevant section of the Frugaldom forums. Could 2013 be YOUR year?

Tales from the Frugaleur (Frugal Entrepreneur).

First month of 2011 almost over and the real challenge begins on 1st February. I've invited a few of the Frugaldom forum members, Twitter followers and Facebook friends to join me in this mini challenge - few are responding.

The challenge is to start with £10 cash and use it to begin our journey towards becoming frugaleurs - frugal entreprenuers. Can we turn a profit on our original investment within 10 weeks. The object of the game is to generate sustainable profits, but this is just the start. In order to beat the banks, we need only increase the £10 by around 6.7p, so it really shouldn't be much of a challenge.

So, time for me to clear the way to getting started for Tuesday 1st February 2011. I'll be documenting every step of the way, so feel free to comment, join in or just keep reading for the entertainment value alone.

There's a dedicated forum thread for this challenge HERE. Please feel free to visit.

Join us in the fun, frugal forum at http://www.frugaldom.co.uk/
Read the Frugaldom Blog at http://www.frugaldom.com/
Follow Frugaldom on www.twitter.com/frugaldom

SOCIAL NETWORKING, SPREADING THE WORD, THINK ABOUT IT…

The world's gone Gaga!

Everyone seems to like numbers - statistical analysis, percentages, ratios, conversion rates, the price of cheese... so I've looked at a few more. Before discussing them, I'd like you to take a quick think about these popular websites - with Apps!

I don't really 'do' Facebook, as far as social media and business networking is concerned. I do find it extremely handy for keeping up to date with friends and family, arranging social events and, in general, doing anything except work. We can share photos, reminisce, poke fun at one another and pick up from wherever we left off, even if we haven't seen one another for years.

Facebook is fun, it's where we hang out with familiar faces, it's where we go to skive, or to sit down at the end of a frustrating day and relax. OK, so our photos have probably all been digitally scanned for facial recognition, profiled, logged and listed in some Government funded, global database but, on the whole, we don't care. It's Facebook

Making your way in the world today takes everything you've got.
Taking a break from all your worries, sure would help a lot.
Wouldn't you like to get away?
Sometimes you want to go
Where everybody knows your name, and they're always glad you came.
You wanna be where you can see, our troubles are all the same
You wanna be where everybody knows your name.
You wanna go where people know, people are all the same,
You wanna go where everybody knows your name.


Theme song lyrics from 'Cheers'
"Where Everybody Knows Your Name"
by Gary Portnoy & Judy Hart Angelo

To me, that's Facebook!

Twitter, on the other hand, is about a hard and fast game. It's about the hard sell, the attention grabbing, the in your face, fast driven media. It's a digital revolution that combined the Internet with mobile phones on every level and is now threatening to outpace the national news networks and revolutionise the 'text all' facility on our mobile phones. On Twitter, there is no 10 second delay - it's out there for all to see and it's what's happening now.


In my opinion, the Twitter + Facebook combination doesn't work very well for the 'man on the street'. You just wouldn't take Wall Street, CNN and The Whitehouse staff to meet your friends at Cheers. Twitter is far too fast moving for such a cheerful, jaunty tune. Twitter, by comparison, is Rimsky-Korsakov's Flight of the Bumblebee!


Facebook's social network was launched around 2004, the brain child of college students. Within seven years, it reportedly welcomed 600 million active users worldwide. The there was a book about it's origins and now we have a film (due for release February 2011, here in UK, already released in USA).


Twitter appeared on the scene a couple of years later, in 2006. It's more of a micro-blogging site, based on the 140 characters allowed within a standard mobile phone text message. To date, it's said to have around 190 million users.


Curiously, individuals, companies, charities and other groups appear to be using Twitter as a source of gathering customers, members or participants in all manner of things, including using it as an introductory gateway to... you got it, Facebook! But the two, allegedly, have no affiliation to one another - unless you count the vested interests of Marc Andreessen. Indeed, it was reported that Twitter declined an offer worth around $500 million from Facebook. Astonishingly, the Twitter founders still don't sound sure of which direction their company is heading, other than up.


It's all very strange and beyond my comprehension. Everywhere we look we see signs, suggestions or hints of big names, but they are no longer those of tobacco, alcohol, drug or oil companies. Instead, they belong to the 21st Century World Wide Web - eBay, Amazon, YouTube, Facebook and now Twitter.

Many TV shows, including news programmes, flash up a Twitter username for audience interaction or participation. 'Tweet us @whatever!' In fact, I've even noticed a trend toward small print simply saying @whatever, without any reference to Twitter! Only those 'in the know' understand it, though.

Mobile phone networks seem to fit more comfortably with social networking than, say, retailers or service providers, although they are all begining to interact. URL shortening drives countless streams of traffic to countless websites and probably about 1% of those visitors convert to customers. But how do the numbers crunch for small players in this fast-flowing game of digital networking? Is success a dead cert or are the odds stacked against us?

With a UK population of almost 62 million, the BBC can reach over two thirds of us every week. Programmes like Eastenders can attract viewer figures far in excess of 10 million. A major event, like the funeral of Princess Diana, attracted over 30 million viewers. (So did the 1966 World Cup!) That's just UK.

Now let's go global, which is what WikiLeaks does when it hits the headlines throughout the International mass media network. I haven't looked at global figures, so I haven't a clue how many individuals on this planet have access to such things as TV, radio or Internet, but I do know that it's many, many millions and that the stakes are high when it comes to communicatioln with them all.

WikiLeaks has been mentioned several times over the past months. What fantastic publicity! Almost every newspaper, TV station and news broadcaster has uttered the name. Just like eBay, YouTube, Amazon, Google and Facebook, WikiLeaks momentarily became a household 'name'. So, how well are they doing in the publicity stakes compared to others? Keep in mind that there's no income generated just from seeing a name. (All figures correct at time of writing.)

How many people like eBay on Facebook? 411,320
How many usernames follow eBay on Twitter? 23,131

How many people like the main BBC World News on Facebook? 521,551

How many usernames follow BBC World News on Twitter? 448,671

How many people like Amazon on Facebook? 525,467

How many usernames follow Amazon on Twitter? 58,948

How many people like the WikiLeaks Facebook page? 1,557,588

How many usernames follow WikiLeaks on Twitter? 679,918

How many people like the main CNN on Facebook? 1,691,464

How many usernames follow CNN Breaking News on Twitter? 3,754,210

How many people like iPhone on Facebook? 1,872,655

How many usernames follow iPhone on Twitter? Can't find their official account!

How many people like Google on Facebook? 2,499,468

How many usernames follow Google on Twitter? 2,714,933 INTERESTING

How many people like iTunes on Facebook? 10,218,408
How many usernames follow iTunes on Twitter? They have several categories:
iTunes Trailers - 1,578, 784 : Music - 619,188 : Movies - 53,048 : TV - 45,312 : Pod casts - 43,725

How many people like YouTube on Facebook? 26,257,028

How many usernames follow YouTube on Twitter? 1,556,061

How many people like the Lady Gaga page on Facebook? 26,932,157
How many usernames follow Lady Gaga on Twitter? 7,869,076
How many like the Lady Gaga page on Amazon?

I think this tells us that virtual social networking, blogging and micro-blogging is more about negative escapism for the masses. We cannot accurately analyse the global reach of such platforms when they are subject to Government legislation, even banned in some countries, but we can begin to understand the enormity of the Internet and all the associated problems that brings with it. What I can see is that communication is key. Apple's iPhone, alone, boasts 62,949,864 monthly active users, so how many Internet users might there be?

Next, in this comedy sketch, come the big guns, those who profit from providing the masses with an assortment of negative escape routes from the harsh realities of their lives – whether they be virtual, actual, medical or psychological. Their wingmen are the financial institutions and the major drugs, food, drink, alcohol and tobacco industries.

Following them, there are the general money-makers, chasing along in an effort to entice the masses to part with their cash. Many don't care how, why, where or what for, it only matters that they succeed in generating wealth. The further down the line we go, the fewer stragglers there are with cash left over to spend. That's where we find the micro-loan companies springing up, in their hope of earning from those who have fallen by the wayside.

So what does this all mean for a budding entrepreneur, frugal or otherwise? Where, next, should our enterprising minds and spare investment capital be heading? What might be, the next 'big thing'?


Perhaps we should hold onto our hats, harness our dreams and be prepared for the ride of our lives. It could be fact, fiction and fantasy all rolled into one. It does not have to be within eyesight for us to see it, nor within earshot for us to hear it. Perhaps, even, the Mayans knew much more then than we do now.

Think about it…

Frugaldom Forums at http://www.frugaldom.co.uk/
Frugaldom Blog at http://www.frugaldom.com/
Follow Frugaldom on Twitter

Take the Challenge - Take £10 and Grow a Money Tree

Micro Money Making Challenges

 As a member of the free Frugaldom forums, you are invited to take part in any of our moneysaving challenges. But if you have ambitions beyond just reducing your cost of living, shifting debt or growing your savings, then you might be interested in participating in one of NYK Media's micro-moneyMAKING challenges and trying your hand at earning from home or developing your own business ideas.

Have you got what it takes to become a frugaleur (frugal entrepreneur)?

I am looking for enthusiastic individuals who would like the chance to explore their own frugal micro-business potential and don't mind a bit of a challenge. It's a tiny challenge, but from little acorns, great oaks can grow.

Micro-moneymaking challenge No. 1

Can you start a business with £10? Can you beat the banks and turn a better profit?

If you would like to take part in this challenge, register here - it's free. Anyone can join/play/take part. For the purposes of this first challenge, as it will be the easiest, it will run for approximately 10 weeks. Over that time, you might be able to earn as much as 6.7p interest from a high interest savings account, so you can see that it isn't much of a challenge to beat that.

As an added incentive, NYK Media will provide the initial £10 to selected, money savvy challengers...

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