I love Twitter. I always have. But, the Notary content on Twitter is horrible. Notaries have so little to say, and so few use Twitter. I like Stuart Berman’s notary profile. He has inspiring quotes and notary advertising. Some other Notaries talk about the voting controversies that involve whether or not Notaries are needed to notarize absentee ballots. A few publish ads about their service or talk about personal things.

But, why is there absolutely no interesting notary content? I publish interesting links, but get little response. And then I publish my commentary about current affairs which gets a huge response.

I would like my experience on Twitter to be more Notary oriented, but if you guys have nothing interesting to say, then Twitter will have little good Notary content. Twitter is only as interesting as you make it as a group. So please make it interesting.

On Friday at about 2am on June 5th I got a call from our server people in Missouri. I recognized the number and decided to answer. They told me that they tried to update a patch on our operating system, but couldn’t get the site up and running again. I asked what to do. They told me that their technical expert recommended getting on a new server. Unfortunately, that is not so easy.

We were already working with programming on migrating to a new server. We needed more disk space, more memory, and especially a more modern operating system. Our Microsoft 2008 system no longer had maintenance, and the danger from hacking was growing stronger. But, I had no idea that our server would crash.

I normally sleep during the day and work in the afternoon and evening. But, I went without sleep on Friday for the most part. I had to get in touch with a critical person at hosting and go over a quote for a new server. I had tried to communicate and get a quote by email, but the critical contact person was impossible to get information from. How frustrating. In any case, I got my quote for the server set up I wanted. It has the right amount of extra storage, memory, and a 2016 operating system which is what the company was best set up to maintain.

They said they needed up to 24 hours to create the server environment. Programming needed 25 hours to do their end of the bargain. But, how many days would this take? That is 49 hours of labor plus coordinating from one company to the other. People need to sleep, and what if there were delays.

We were down until Friday the 12th at around noon. So, it was about 7.5 days. Carmen and I were getting very anxious. I didn’t know if my current data was safe or whether I would have to revert to older data from a few days ago. I didn’t know if things would take forever. What if there was a problem once the site was online.

To my happy surprise, there were only a few small programming issues. Notaries would not be able to login until that got fixed which I assume will be anywhere from 24 to 72 hours, but you never know.

In any case, that Friday the 5th when the site crashed — I couldn’t sleep and was a wreck when I got up around noon. I had to walk to acupuncture, get to the health food store for some green juice and then go home. I was juice fasting. I was weak. I was afraid. I tried to be patient and do other things I needed to do. I did laundry that I had been procrastinating. I did my tax deductions which is a huge endeavor for me as I love to put it off. The good news is that once my taxes were 90% done, the site came back on and there were very few problems. What a relief.

The panic was about — what if I lose my business? That couldn’t happen… or could it? What would my life be like? On Sunday the 7th I went to the beach in Malibu at night — just like freshly unemployed people do in the movies. I went to ask what is life all about as I watched the waves endlessly come in. What would I do? What would Carmen do? Would she lose her house? God! What a horrible thought. I was more worried about her than me. Would I start another business in this Covid19 world? No. I would first lose as much weight as possible and get my health in good shape.

So, no data was lost. The site is fine. Carmen is fine. I am fine. And our customers are fine, but a bit annoyed with all the downtime. This problem was completely beyond any of our control. It was a server crash. In 20 years operating 6 sites, I have never seen anything like this. But, it happened, we had backup, and we survived. And I am not sure how long I will feel traumatized by what happened. I had a bad car breakdown in 2018. It took almost a year and a half to get over it. Every time I drove down Sunset in Palisades I would get nervous. I am over it now. No more anxiety driving down that road. I just hope my server crash anxiety will go away soon. Those seven days of downtime were hard. I wanted to cry during much of it. Just wanted to share my thoughts.

I have had a little bit of trouble with Facebook over the years. It seems they think it is their right to stifle my American freedoms such as freedom of press.

We published an article with a tarot card. This got flagged since the card had several figures in it one of which was a naked doll that had no genitals. This is not offensive and does not contain any private parts, yet was arbitrarily banned. This is censorship, and similar to what is done in communist countries. I feel my rights have been stepped on.

Then, if I write anything about Trump, positive, negative or just commentary, it can get blocked by Facebook. Even photos of the white house can get banned.

All of this unnecessary heavy handed control tactics are very left-wing, are damaging to my click through rates, and also make me feel repressed or oppressed. I love my government, and my government is not doing any repression. Private businesses led by people with intolerant political points of view are undermining my basic human rights. Not fair. Facebook is a utility and should not hamper my freedom of expression.

I just wonder if the government will ever crack down on them.

However, I have another solution. Leave it to the user to set a filter. If they want to see any type of post, then fine. If they want to filter out political, right wing, moderate, or left wing oriented posts, race oriented posts, or whatever else bothers them — let them filter it themselves rather than having Facebook just ban all types of things.

Society has really changed and the new generation doesn’t seem to have American values or traditional values anymore. Hmmm.

Our newsletter email provider sent me some notices saying that my open rate was too low for the newsletter. That would affect if my newsletter made it to the inbox for many of my subscribers. So, it is imperative that I improve my open rates.

What I did was to work on having more compelling titles to subject lines. I also removed a lot of subscribers from the newsletter list if they had not opened anything in four months.

So, if you get our newsletter, please open the emails and click on at least one article. That way we can keep sending it to you. And we will try to keep making the newsletter as interesting as possible as well.

Thanks.

Facebook was a popular way for 123notary get reach in our marketing and come into contact with a lot more people. But, in the last few years, Facebook got more and more restrictive in what you could post, especially on promoted posts. If anyone complained about a title being even slightly controversial or a photo used then I would get in trouble.

Facebook is a utility of sorts. In the USA, we have freedom of speech and press, and what we say on the phone or other communication utilities is our right. How I interact with my users on Facebook should be up to me. But, Facebook has intervened and told me that my image of a tarot card cannot be used because there is a figure of a naked person. It is so small I didn’t notice and it is a dummy person with no genitals, yet someone still complained.

It is a bit like living in a communist country where people are in a huge hurry to report you to the authorities for doing any tiny thing wrong. Why are Americans in such a hurry to limit another person’s freedom of expression? It baffles me. But, the current consciousness of Americans loves repression of freedom of speech, loves lynchings of people who have been accused of being racist or sexist whether the accusation is true or not, and even approves of torture of alleged terrorists. What is the world coming to? This is not the America I grew up in. It is getting very Marxist.

At any rate. a few years after Facebook became overly constrictive, I noticed that Facebook became a lot less popular in general, especially for 123notary. It is getting to the point where we might lower our involvement with Facebook or stop altogether. I feel that they developed bad karma from being too restrictive and that they lost a huge chunk of their business as a result.

I wonder if they will have a come back or whether they are just a has been who might be popular with an aging population but will never be popular with the millennials who run the country now. Hmmm.

I remember back in 2017 I was testing Notaries by phone. Many were complaining very loudly. There were Facebook groups that would bash us daily just because I wanted to have quality standards. Most Notaries claim to be great, but without testing them it does not make sense to take their word for it.

In any case, I heard that recently (in 2019) Notaries are saying nice things about 123notary on a few Facebook groups. It’s about time! All I do is work hard to maintain quality on my site! I stopped testing people by phone in early 2018, so hopefully people will forget about how unpleasant it is.

The real problem with the testing is that people did not want to be tested, and furthermore, they mostly did not know the answers. We test now by email and most people just don’t respond. But, those who do respond have time to think about the questions and answer them at a time that is favorable to them. Many people learn something answering my questions too.

Notary Public 101 is a free course I created that is on the blog. It is free and you do not need a password. Learn all about notary procedure, confirming appointments, handling tough situations, and more. You need to know this information anyway, so try to set apart some time and master it.

123notary strives hard to benefit Notaries even if we are tough sometimes. If we are demanding it is for a good reason — so we can please the users by offering them the best quality notaries possible. Thanks to those who say nice things about us on social media.

Welcome to JuratBook, a social media site for Notaries. Notaries typically use this to complain about slow paying signing companies, and boast about how good their 123notary listing is doing.

With JuratBook, you can post an unlimited amount of special notary emoji’s on your posts. The surprised emoji would be if you got paid on time. The sad emoji would be if there were too many fax backs. A heart emoji would be because you love Jeremy and Carmen. A thumbs up (or thumb prints up) would be if you either liked a particular signing company, or if you thumb printed someone.

You can take selfies of you and your customers and post them. You can talk about what you do when you are not notarizing.

The problem with JuratBook is that it makes people more competitive about how popular they are. It makes you think your life isn’t as full as all these other people with lots of postings who celebrate life every day.

Unlike Facebook, you can use hateful speech on JuratBook. It has to be allowed, because Notaries are so frustrated by not getting paid on time. JuratBook believes in freedom of speech.

The algorithm used for JuratBook helps promote posts more about the social aspects of being a Notary rather than dull work related posts.

What constitutes JuratBook friendship? Do you have to notarize each other? Or have each other’s thumb print? The rules keep changing as the owner Sam Zuckerberg — Mark’s lesser known and less successful brother.

JuratBook — your social media venue!

You might also like:

Affiant – a social media site for notaries
http://blog.123notary.com/?p=6410

Yes, it’s the Notary dating show
http://blog.123notary.com/?p=15312

It was bad. For months, my left leg was killing me. And on my right leg there was sciatic pain. The right buttocks would hurt when I sat for long hours. The left side of my left leg would hurt so badly when I walked, that I had to take one minute breaks every five minutes or so.

Finally, I went to the acupuncturist and he said my circulation was not good in my legs and that I had a muscle spasm. So, he gave me some acupuncture. I had gone to another acupuncturist a week before who also gave me acupuncture with the biggest needles I had ever seen.

But, walking had become such a problem. I took the bus to Koreatown a few times. It is only a few miles down Wilshire. I remember walking home from Koreatown twice. I had to stop every five minutes because the tension and pain was unbearable. And taking my neighborhood walks to Whole Foods and around the park became very painful as well. The hot baths helped a little, but weren’t good enough.

On a brighter note, Koreatown was fun. I took the bus there because parking is so expensive. I tried a great Oaxacan place and had different types of mole and Oaxacan style tortillas which were excellent. I tried Bengladeshi tandoori for only two bucks at a market.

After trying about ten places, I finally found a massage therapist who I could commit to. After she worked on my left leg three times, I was finally able to walk without pain. But, this lady kept trying to do my back. I told her my back is fine. It is the leg that is a huge problem. I guess some masseuses are on auto-pilot and want to focus on backs. Well thank God my back is no problem because my legs have been bothering me for months.

Now, the legs are okay, but the calves are tight. So, we will be working on those for a while. I am walking three hours a day to get healthy so it is no wonder that my legs get up tight.

So, I am okay now — for now. Wish me luck.

You might also like:

Bad customers are a pain in the liver
http://blog.123notary.com/?p=20005

The way you treat Jeremy might be the same way you treat title
http://blog.123notary.com/?p=19590

Jeremy…you do a great job helping your notaries do a better job and to get more business. Thanks for all the info you send us. I do appreciate it. The other “listing notary companies” just want our money!

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Thanks for all your hard work and dedication to bringing this advice to us. Sometimes the truth is hard to take in but at the end of the day, I would rather have the truth than the lie. Hard work DOESN’T come by twiddling my thumbs and waiting for it to come to me. I’m HUNGRY for knowledge! Therefore, l WILL SUCCEED!

I will do my best to apply this advice in my business.

Respectfully,

Jacqueline Angela Stokes
Integrity Notary Service, Inc.

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I laughed so hard at some of these stories that my side hurts. I’ve been in this “never know what to expect” business since 2009
and I love it because I have never seen two closings that are alike. It’s always an exciting challenge. Sad or funny we all have good memories and I truly appreciate the people I met along the way that allowed me to be a part of their life.
Thank you Jeremy this was GREAT reading!

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Get ’em Jeremy!
I agree with you.
I’ve learned a lot from you.
I appreciate your efforts to weed out the idiots–there are far too many.
I love your website.
Keep it up!

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Great Article. I agree with you. I believe 97% of Notaries will flunk your test.

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The following is not meant to be a political statement. As Susan Collins said recently….. “we have forgotten the common values that bind us together as Americans”. That appears to be your problem when you state that “Being nice in my job description comes last in a long list of other requirements.”
Being nice, whether you are the hiring party or not, is a basic human value that we all need to remember. I am not trying to be antagonistic or whiny. I am tired of seeing the constant division is this county and I would like to see all of us benefit from your business and your knowledge. Please take a moment to think about this and try to see things from your and our prospective.

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BRAVO Jeremy!! Your explanations are SO clear and logical. Of course, I agree with all you said.Over 25 years dealing with my Journals has proved to me: There’s no room for Multiple Choice in a journal. Can’t possibly cover all possible choices.

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One thing is for sure: I find coverage here that I don’t find anywhere else.

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When you do the episode “Notaries Without Underwear”, let me know.

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Once again, Jeremy proves he is a champion for notaries, without 123Notary I would not be as successful in acquiring business clients. Thank you Jeremy!!!

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What are Jeremy’s intentions?
http://blog.123notary.com/?p=20935

Opinions about snapdocs in blog comments
http://blog.123notary.com/?p=21299