Open Office 3.0, the latest version of the free, open source alternative to Microsoft Office, has been released.

Whether you don’t want to splash out on expensive, proprietory applications like Word, PowerPoint, Excel etc, or just want to stick it to the man by not giving Bill Gates even more of your money, Open Office is the way to go.

It offers equivalent packages to all the major office tools: word processing, databases, spreadsheets, graphic / image manipulation, presentations. It’s compatible with Microsoft, so you can open .doc files etc in open office, edit them and they’ll still work with Microsoft apps. There can occasionally be formatting issues if moving documents between systems, but nothing too bad. And if used as your primary suite of apps in the office or home, there won’t be a problem.

It’s a great option for home workers, small businesses, freelancers etc.

Simply get your free download here and join the open source revolution!

The site may be operating in basic mode at the moment due to high demand, but downloads are still available.

Take a look at Open Office and its tools over on the Lifehacker website.

You can also get a portable version for your memory stick to use anywhere. This is of a slightly earlier version though.

Sick of reading about the credit crunch? So are we. So let’s do what we can to turn this downturn upside down.

In the spirit of achieving this goal, we proudly present part four of our series of tips from Freedom Coaching on how to protect your business from these economic hard times. This week we look at Douglas Adams’ favourite industry, marketing…

Step 4 - Marketing

Get good at marketing. No matter what business we are in, we are all in the business of marketing. Irrespective of whether you are in the plumbing or accounting business, as the business owner, you can stop struggling by getting good at marketing.

Imagine having an automated qualified lead generation system, where work just flowed through the door and things were so good that you have to switch off the tap every now and again to catch up! Does this sound interesting to you?

As the business owner, it is your job to create this system. Once you have, you can say goodbye to struggle and hello to happiness.

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