I planned on delivering to you a “fall primer” buying guide for sometime, but I’ve realized that this is not going to happen. In a last-ditch effort to find something that sparks my attention for a new wardrobe season, I’ve come to the conclusion that there’s just nothing new. This pains me deeply, as fall is my absolute favorite time to buy clothes.

Digging through all my favorite stores and websites, I clearly see how the fashion industry is trying to survive this recession: they’ve laid-off their designers. There were plenty of interesting pieces I saw coming down the runway earlier this year for fall 2009, but these do not seem to have translated to the fall collections offered up to us in the masses.

What I see are recycled designs from the past few seasons. Sure there maybe a slight color change here or a little ruffle added there, but by far these are the exact same fashions we’ve seen over the last few years. There is nothing original or interesting and certainly nothing you’d want to splurge your hard earned money on.

This year, my advice is this: sit this one out. Don’t pay top price for recycled designs, when they’re probably already in your closet. Stock up on the basic staples that will get you through the next several seasons and use what you’ve already got. Shorten some of those skirts and dresses (above the knee length), add accessories to update with the colors of the season and round it out with some new shoes if they catch your eye.

Shop the outlets and other discount stores, sales and wait it out until next year. It’s not worth depleting your precious account balance for old designs. You’ll find me at the outlets. Let us cross our fingers that we’ll have some better choices next year.

Before I proceed, let me define the symptoms of Acute PowerPoint Poisoning.

• The text of some laborious Congressional bill pales in comparison to the information contained on your slides (i.e., if you need paragraph delineations on any one slide, you have too much information).
• If the graphs or charts on your slides cause people to grimace and squint as they’re trying to decipher their meaning.
• You end up just reading off the slides because you could not possibly provide as much in-depth information verbally.
• Not one member of your audience is looking at you. They are looking solely at your slides.
• You cannot possibly finish this presentation in the time alloted.

When my boss expressed her disdain for this type of information overload I understood what she meant, as both Jon and I have always agreed that when dealing with information processing and design, less is more.

There is only so much information our brains can process at any one point. If you overload an audience with vast quantities of information, what you will ultimately find is not that you look smarter or more informed, but that your message has been totally lost.

The Law of Parsimony
What this all boils down to is what I will call the Law of Parsimony. If you want to get a message across visually or verbally, keeping it simple works best. You want people to digest the information you provide and the visual design standing behind it as a whole package.

It you overload any one audience with a library’s worth of information backed by a jam-packed set of design heavy slides, chances are that the message will not be conveyed as you intended.

Keep it simple, keep it clean. Allow the information you use to support the personal appeal of your presentation. Bear in mind the Law of Parsimony and you will never risk an untimely death by acute PowerPoint poisoning.

When survey results like these are released, it is typical to focus on the negative. Yes, we know people are not hired or fired because they post obnoxious and inappropriate photos or comments. We’ve discussed the repercussions of this type of behavior before.

There is, however, a positive side. Namely, that your social media page can help get you hired. It shows your personality and fills in the gaps left by a resume or an interview.

Use of social networking sites can also increase odds of getting hired, with employers citing a good feel for the candidate’s personality, a profile that supports their qualifications and a candidate who showed creativity as reasons for deciding to hire someone based on their online postings.

Keep posting, don’t let these numbers scare you. If you use common sense while being yourself, your Facebook or Twitter pages just might help you take the next step!

I absolutely hate July. If we could just skip the entire thing I would be very relieved. July is so difficult for me because it was the month a few years ago when a stroke virtually took away my mother. It’s even hard for me to write this now without feeling myself tense up. I was still a very young adult when this happened. Jon and I were newlyweds and I was about to start graduate school. I’ve had to live with the pain everyday since, but July always becomes almost unbearable.

Still, life goes on and I can’t just lock myself away like a hermit for 30+ days. The world keeps on demanding, so I have to keep going. At times, we all have to carry on when our worlds are crumbling or just with something small that doesn’t feel any less surmountable. We all have to work through the pain.

How do I function through this? Honestly, sometimes I have no idea. If only there were some magic pill that could make it all better. What I do know is pain makes us who we are as people. It defines our characters like nothing else. Pain inherently makes us human and it allows people to connect to us in a way that no other emotion can come even close.

Some would advise you here to just bury the pain, pretend like it’s not there – pain is not professional. I say use the pain. Turn it into passion when you pitch. Use the those strong emotions to show how much you care about the people you’re talking to and business for which you’re presenting. Use it to connect on a personal level that’s more than just business.

In the end I think that’s all we can do. Try to use the pain for something positive. In my experience no matter what we do it’s still there. No matter how much we try to deny or bury it, it’s still there. I’d rather have that pain expressed on my terms instead of coming out in some unintended way that can have negative consequences.

I’m very glad it’s now August and quickly moving into September. I feel better than I did a few weeks ago, but I next year awful July will come again. All I can do is deal with it the best I can and try to convert the most horrible emotions I’ve ever experienced into something I hope would make my mother proud.

Late last night, news broke that Facebook was launching “Facebook Lite.” No one knows exactly what it is, but signs point to an unpleasant week for Twitter. This could mean a service that now offers the features we love about Twitter, like real-time updates coupled with Facebook’s dependability and strength (i.e.,Twitter + Facebook.)

If Facebook does this right, Twitter may be dead in the water. Facebook has the financial resources and technical superiority to challenge Twitter and they mean business. Twitter doesn’t appear to have the money to fight this assault, faces a seemingly endless stream of bad press and it doesn’t look like it’s going to get any better.

Is it too soon to call Twitter’s swan song? Possibly. Maybe we’ll know tomorrow or even within the next few hours.

We’ll leave you with this little nugget from The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien:

As our worlds become more interconnected, it’s more likely you’re going to get yourself in hot water if you shoot your mouth off online. Mashable recommends using your privacy settings, but I don’t think it goes far enough. Yes, use your privacy settings, separate your life but seriously reconsider posting anything you wouldn’t want on the front page of the newspaper. That way you’ve got all your bases covered and will not have to worry that something could come back and bite you in the backside.

Related: How to manage your image new media style.

This is not so surprising to us. In our experience using Twitter, it’s mostly comprised of alpha geeks, journalists, people of note, bloggers and businesses looking for, well, more business. The key links here are business and information sharing. Neither of those things would be interesting to teenagers.

Teens want to connect with their friends, share photos, videos and amusing links. They’re not going to be so interested in the latest breaking news or coupons. Barring the 2008 elections—were you really interested in Iran or 20 percent off when you were 17 and mommy and daddy paid for everything?

In our view, we don’t think it’s going anywhere anytime soon or at least the concept of it. However, Twitter has got to figure out ways to:

1. make money
2. integrate with more established social networks like Facebook if it really has a sustainable future.

We see the social networking sites of the future integrating entire social networks (personal and professional – Facebook & LinkedIn), newswires and ways to share large quantities of information while connecting people in unprecedented ways (Twitter), pulled together with more traditional e-communications (email & instant chat).

The first site to harness all these characteristics into one user-friendly working model will, in our opinion, win the internet.

Our previous posts primed and made you presentable. Technically, Twitter is much less friendly to everyday internet users. Jon calls it more “hardcore computer nerd.” Once, you get the lingo, however, it’s really very simple.

These guidelines should help:

• Know where you’re @. An “@” sign is computer language for identifying a user. My Twitter handle is @Katie_Bishop and Jon’s is @jon_bpi. Twitter search is not always the most thorough and advice you’ll find on any reputable tech blog, (e.g., @mashable) is don’t put you’re handle on the portion of your bio that asks for your name, put your actual name. This will make you more searchable.
• Bit.ly is your best friend. As you’ve only got 140 characters, sites like Bit.ly or Tiny URL (to name a couple) help you make the most of those characters by condensing links.
• Know your “R’s.” – the difference between “reply” and “retweet.” Reply when you want to address a specific person. These tweets will only go to mutual followers. Only retweet or RT when you think this information is important for all your followers to see. If you blast your every move on Twitter you are in grave danger of becoming a  “twitter s***ter.” Not a title you want.
• You want to be Mentioned.  A mention happens anytime someone puts your handle (e.g., @Katie_Bishop) in a tweet, be it a reply, retweet or just mentioning you in their tweet. When someone searches for you on Twitter your mentions will appear on the search results. You can check for your own mentions by clicking on your handle link on the right side of your Twitter screen. Programs like TweetDeck and Seesmic Desktop make it easy to view mentions from your desktop.
• Hash Tags. These are key words that can help make you more searchable on Twitter. They’re often found at the end of a tweet with or without a “#” sign in front of them. For instance, if I want to know about tweets concerning Microsoft, I would put #Microsoft  at the end of a post about that company or put it into Twitter Search to see what people are tweeting about that subject.

Have more questions? katie@bigpictureimage.com, @Katie_Bishop or post below.

Next post in the series will be on Facebook.

The hardest part about self-doubt is its merciless and reoccurring nature. No matter how many times you beat it back it still rears its ugly head. There’s no trick or quick fix advice I can give you. No magic words or meditation ritual. The only way to slay the dragon is to live with it. Get comfortable with it.

Think of the movie “A Beautiful Mind” with Russell Crowe. As Crowe’s character struggles with schizophrenic delusions, he realizes he can’t make them go away. The only way he can move on with his life and achieve his goals is to live with them. He knows they are there, but doesn’t let them dictate his life. It’s the same with self-doubt, all we can do is live with it, know it’s there and not let it get the best of us.

Mastering public speaking is all about managing fear and the doubt it brings. It’s only fear that can stop you from giving presentations and pitches to your best possible potential. If you have the mental discipline to keep working, you can function and thrive regardless of the situation. We choose what rules our lives and have full power over our demons. You certainly don’t have to love or even like them, but if you can learn to live with your demons you’ll realize they will only stop you if you let them.

From The Cut:

Finally, Nordstrom is coming to New York!…Maybe the recession will be the best thing to ever happen to Union Square shops.

We know that NY is a bit starved for style, so we’re glad to lend a helping hand. Its the least we can do in such difficult times.

NY, let us know if there’s anything else we can do for you. How about some Windows 7?