With Ted Kennedy’s death and funeral service focusing the spotlight of awareness on the families at the top of the food chain, an interesting question comes to mind.

Are the wealthy and privileged of today as focused on using their money to help the community and allowing it to be of service to the many… at least to the same degree they were back in the day when Andrew Carnegie felt it was his duty to empower the masses through endowing libraries all over the world?

This is an interesting blog post that explores that question.

It begs the question, “What constitutes ‘surplus wealth’?”

I believe Andrew Carnegie would say any money more than what you and your children and your children’s children would need to live on is surplus.

That, for him, likely would not mean a $10 million estate for 16 grandchildren, because he believed money has the potential to corrupt people and cause them to not go out and contribute and be of service.

In other words, if people are given everything, they may feel they have nothing to strive for and would limit how much they’re able to accomplish on their own.

Interesting questions and issues to consider in your own life.

Starting with this one: How important is it to you to be of service to others and make a difference with your life?

How much of a priority is that for you… (and what are you doing about that)?

Also, how much are you giving financially, and how are you deciding the appropriate place or places to contribute to?

The example of the libraries we all can thank Mr. Carnegie for, which even today are helping millions of people give themselves that leg up is what I would consider where the bar has been raised to.

That’s the barometer we can use to gauge how significant our contributions are and how much of a difference we can make through our focus on community service and involvement.

The more you make that a priority, the more supported you are, and the greater the contribution you can make.

It’s quite interesting how that *always* works!

Think about these things and make your Decision, right now, about how much you’re committed to giving, and where you’re contributing it.

The “hows” for the most part will take care of themselves as a result of you making that Decision and putting your focus  there.

That’s part of what we can all learn from applying Think and Grow Rich and living “The Success Philosophy” it has contributed to us and our own wealth.

Warmly,

Dan Klatt,
“Think And Grow Rich Guy”
Founder of the CarnegieCentre and
President of the Internet Marketing Organization

….Serving as Your WealthSensei!

Resources:

- The best way I’m able to help you give more is to help you become extremely wealthy. The best way I’m able to do that is through the “90-Day Prosperity Intensive” I’m currently doing live.

- To better understand the power of giving and how the universe supports that, in direct proportion to the value of your contribution to others, see “Outgiving The Universe“.

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To my knowledge, this information is a world exclusive and you’re hearing it here first!

(I used to be a newspaper reporter for six years and assistant managing editor for four, so getting the scoop has been ingrained in my psyche.)

You know how Microsoft just re-engineered its distant third-place search engine, “Bing”?

If you have your own products or services, you’ve probably put considerable effort into naming them before you release them.

And you appreciate how important that name is.

First of all, what does “Bing” make you think of?

When I first heard of it, I thought, “Bing Crosby? Bing cherries? It’s not a very attractive name.”

The thing is, it is memorable.

Maybe Steve Ballmer and company knew they needed something memorable because the online world had forgotten Microsoft even had a search engine… except for something like 7% of online users.

Just a little piece of advice if you’re planning on making a big launch, or even a small one… you might want to do a careful search of what your *proposed* name means in other languages.

Before you spend millions upon millions of dollars to get as many people as possible to know what that name is.

Particularly if you did not do that process and you end up looking extremely foolish because of this huge oversight, and blunder!

So what did some of the brightest minds and most successful marketers out there anywhere miss?

First of all, people have been talking for years about how China is the emerging global force and we’re all going to need to learn Chinese to reach its billion-plus market and exponentially grow our businesses.

It’s an important culture. It’s an important country. It’s an important economy. And the Chinese language is important.

Especially -BEFORE- you go name your search engine after the Chinese word for *disease*!!!!

(No, I am not kidding, in fact.)

Ever since Microsoft announced it was going to rename its search engine Bing, millions of Chinese-speaking people probably had a big laugh. And maybe it was even a source of great humor for them.

Or maybe they thought, “WTF?”

Now you’re in on the “joke”, too. Except I’m guessing Microsoft won’t think it’s very funny.

Now that the damage is done and they’ve named their search engine, “Disease” -

(No jokes, please, about how fitting that is considering how vulnerable Windows has always been to diseases, requiring everyone to buy anti-virus programs to protect their computers.)

- What’s the “ill” search engine to do?

Change it’s name again? That would be a PR disaster.

Maybe they’re just hoping no one finds out about the ‘Big Bad Bing Blunder” (if Microsoft is even aware of it!)

And they’re just biding their time until the deal with the No. 2 search engine goes through and Yahoo cures “the Disease”.

It won’t be long after that until the world forgets….. and people go back to their daily routine of cursing Windows and looking forward to Google’s operating system arriving.

(Actually, I’m joking about that. I use Vista, and I like it.)

Dan Klatt is president of the Internet Marketing Organization and founder of the CarnegieCentre, which empowers people to Think and Grow Rich.

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