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June 29, 2005

That's fast

I had a note from my ISP this morning that they had doubled the download speeds. They have a site set up where you can test your speed so I thought I would give it a try. I know from trying this in the past that I was lucky to get around 500kbs.

Sure enough... today's attempt showed me I was downloading at a speed of 1MB per second.

I was impressed.

Posted by Steve MacLellan at 05:26 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

June 28, 2005

Yahoo 360

I was reading Lee Odden announcement that says:

Yahoo 360 has opened up their social network, Yahoo 360 to everyone. Now, as long as you have a Yahoo account, you can get your own 360 account.

I guess it is kind of cool for those who can't build their own site. I suppose it has some marketing value... just haven't figured out what that might be yet.

Any ideas?

Posted by Steve MacLellan at 06:00 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

June 27, 2005

Thingamablog

I would imagine it would be pretty easy to use a blog program that didn't require you to install cgi, Php/MySQL scripts. I haven't tried it but but I just recently discovered Thingamablog that will do that.

The home page says:

Thingamablog is a cross-platform, standalone blogging application that makes authoring and publishing your weblogs almost effortless. Unlike most blogging solutions, Thingamablog does NOT require a third-party blogging host, a cgi/php enabled web host, or a MySQL database. In fact, all you need to setup, and manage, a blog with Thingamablog is FTP, SFTP, or network access to a web server.

I checked out some of the blogs that have been made with this software. The ones I looked at seemed great.

Have you tried it?

Posted by Steve MacLellan at 03:47 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

June 26, 2005

Online Profits at the Speed of Light

I had an email this morning from Bob Serling who said he is looking for people who want to participate in a new ebook he's creating. It's called:

This book will give you an opportunity to get tremendous exposure for yourself and your business, or just to help others.

1. How to contribute material for the ebook.

The gist of the book is simple. Just answer the following question:

"What are the fastest, cheapest, most effective things you do to market online?"

The idea is to keep things as short and easy to act on as possible. At the same time, feel free to take the space you need to make your contribution as useful as possible. You may also include a resource box with contact information and any special offer you may want to include.

He's also looking for bonuses to include with this product. So if you have a report, interview, or some other material that you'd like to offer as a bonus, be sure to let him know.

The deadline for getting your materials to me is July 27th, but he would prefer to get them as early as possible.

2. Significant exposure for the product

He's arranged with a number of companies with large lists to joint venture the product and he's looking for even more. Right now, it looks like there will be in excess of 500,000 people who receive the promo for this product. So you should get tremendous exposure for your products and services.

Also due to the name recognition of the experts he expects to contribute to the book, it should generate strong interest and sales. The list of experts currently committed to participate at this point include:

Bob Bly, John Carlton, Dave Dee, Randy Gage, David Garfinkel, Paul Hartunian, John Jantsch, Audri Lanford, Paul Lemberg, Clayton Makepeace, Ken McCarthy, George McKenzie, Paul Myers, Bob Scheinfeld, Yanik Silver, Joe Vitale, Jeff Walker, and Pamela Yellen.

He also expects to have at least a dozen more experts, as well. All of this fire power should make the book very attractive to buyers.

Please send him your submission as soon as possible and he will get back to you right away to let you know if its been accepted. Send submissions to: opebook@DirectMarketingInsider.com

Bob Serling is the editor of the the popular Direct Marketing Insider newsletter.

UPDATE: July 3, 2005. For those of you who are considering submitting articles to be considered for Bob's eBook, there have been a couple of samples posted to his site. Use these to get an idea for the the types of articles he is looking for.

Posted by Steve MacLellan at 10:46 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

June 23, 2005

Yellow Pages usage declines

Don MacLeod of Ideas4Rent reports:

It's bad news for those who sell Yellow Pages advertising and important information for Yellow Pages advertisers. New research shows that more consumers are using Internet search engines for local shopping information rather than their phone books.

He says that a recent report from Adweek shows "70 percent of US adults use the Internet as an information source when shopping locally for products and services."

This is more or less consistent with a report titled Shoppers Cruise to Auto Sites, that was released by ClickZ Stats on September 24, 2004, that said:

Consumer Reports found that 77 percent of pre-owned vehicle shoppers research prices, and 77 percent go online to do so.

If your business isn't online, now is the time to do it.

Posted by Steve MacLellan at 06:34 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

June 21, 2005

Divorced? How about a Fembot?

If you like watching re-runs of Data on Star Trek, Next Generation, you will like this.

Business 2.0 Blog reported today about a female android that made its debut at the 2005 World Expo in Japan. Apparently the android is named "Repliee Q1" and it supposed to look like a Japanese housewife.

You can see a couple of images here and a brief article. My curiosity got the best of me so I did a little searching.

Another site about the robot was found here which includes three MPG videos you can watch that show it in action.

I also found a bit of discussion around the web on it including one poster who said:

Look out, ladies! Fembots are coming to steal your men away!

Repliee Q1 expo developer Ishiguro said:

When a robot looks too much like the real thing, it's creepy, but if they resemble human beings, it also makes communication easier.

There are some more links and videos at androidscience.com that offer more information about this project.

I haven't heard any mention of the price for one of these yet, but I would expect it would be in the neighborhood of your house and car. ;-)

Posted by Steve MacLellan at 04:40 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

June 09, 2005

Are you looking for a web content management system?

While musing over how much to charge for the eBook I am writing, a newsletter from PC Magazine came in today announcing a new eBook that compares 18 Web Content Management Systems.

What would a eBook like this be worth to you?

web content management systems product comparison guide

The Guide provides detailed information on:

* 18 WCM products and vendors
* Features and functionality (over 400 individual features compared)
* Pricing
* Support

PRICE: $599

I wonder how many of these they will sell? If you're interested you can pick up a copy here.

Certainly a lot of work went into this report. Still, I feel that is a pretty hefty price tag.

Posted by Steve MacLellan at 03:12 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

June 08, 2005

First Business: Preview

Over the course of the next few weeks there will be tutorial posted to the other blog in multiple sections that will show you how to build your first business website.

I hope to have the first part ready next week. You can check this page to keep track of it's progress or to buy when it is ready.

Posted by Steve MacLellan at 12:47 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

*IMPORTANT* Please Confirm Your Account

I've been getting what seems like a number of stupid spam emails with this subject line: *IMPORTANT* Please Confirm Your Account.

The emails go on to say:

Dear Valued Member, According to our site policy you will have to confirm your account by the following link or else your account will be suspended within 24 hours for security reasons. http://www.homebusiness-websites.com/confirm.php?email=steve@homebusiness-websites.com Thank you for your attention to this question. We apologize for any inconvenience. Sincerely,Homebusiness-websites Security Department Assistant.

Naturally the URL does not exist. If it did, it would mean I would have had to place the file on my server.

This must be one clueless spammer. Anyone else getting these?

Posted by Steve MacLellan at 06:12 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

June 07, 2005

Web Standards and CSS

An article on Robin's site led me to a link led me to an article titled "Web Standards in the Real World: An Interview with Molly Holzschlag.

She says:

CSS is ready for prime time

I hate to dis-agree but....

But when your client says they want a link or tag line placed at the bottom of the third column and you email the client and say, "Gee, I'm sorry... but the DIV and CSS used don't support this, you're going to find the client saying, "Look, do I have to find someone else to do this?"

You say, "No" ...because you want your money, and then go ahead and break every rule in the book.

The client that hires you to build his/her website, doesn't understand coding practices and limitations. All they understand is what they want.

The image/icon on the bottom of the website that takes you to the W3C validator to verify the site as Xhtml strict type document, doesn't mean a damn thing to your client.

And if you're only writing web pages that validate as W3C Xhtml strict, that you're not living in the real world.

Posted by Steve MacLellan at 02:38 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Observations on Advertising

An interesting article I saw this morning suggests that the placement of your ad on a website, as well as the design of the ad, contribute greatly to the advertising campaign.

"Observation: People avoid looking directly at some ads while looking at others; performance depends on placement."

The article is based on a report:

EYETRACK III FINDINGS
This report is one of many from the Eyetrack III study of broadband-era news websites.

46 people were tested for one hour each in December 2003 by Eyetools Inc. in partnership with the Poynter Institute and the Estlow Center. During the test period, each test subject viewed mock news websites created for research purposes and real-world multimedia news features. Results were published in September 2004.

If you are thinking of paying for advertising on other websites you might want to read this first. You will get more bang for your buck depending on how the ad is designed and where it is placed on the website.

Posted by Steve MacLellan at 07:39 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

June 06, 2005

CSS Selectors

A nice article from Michael Youssef on Learning to use CSS Selectors and how to group them is available from devarticles.com.

This article is meant for beginners, so if you already have the basics mastered you can skip it. On the other hand, it you're new to CSS it is a "must read."

Posted by Steve MacLellan at 01:37 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

June 03, 2005

Opportunity gaps

Bob Serling recently wrote an article about opportunity gaps and how to capitalize on them. He quoted this example from a dentist who was barely paying the bills:

"So he looked outside his industry and noticed that more and more businesses were staying open later at night to gain business from people who were busy working all day. Supermarkets stayed open later, as did many malls, convenience stores, record stores, restaurants, and so on.

Following the lead of all these other businesses, he decided to become "The Night Time Dentist", with office hours from 4:00 pm to midnight, five nights per week. He sent fliers to businesses in his area with employees who work the day shift, as well as to the homes in his surrounding area.

Within weeks, his once thin appointment book was filled to capacity. And it's continued that way for many years."

You can read the article here.

Posted by Steve MacLellan at 08:25 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

June 01, 2005

AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual-Core Processor

Today, AMD announced the immediate availability of the AMD Athlon™ 64 X2 Dual-Core processor.

This is the sort of system many of us will need to upgrade to when the next version of Windows (codenamed Longhorn) becomes available.

Posted by Steve MacLellan at 05:31 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Free CD Ripper

Sometimes in my line of work I have clients sending me audio CD's to extract their audio in .cda format to convert to a sound format that can be streamed online.

I haven't tried it... but this Free CD Ripper looks like a handy tool for anyone that needs to do the same thing.

Posted by Steve MacLellan at 07:39 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack