SEO Video Lesson #2 from Cool Site of the Day

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87P6t0fTofk

SEO Video Lesson #1 from Cool Site of the Day

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TX-s31CmnSk

Windows 7 Release Candidate leaked?

Adrian Kingsley-Hughes: I received confirmation early on Wednesday that build 7100 had been finalized and noticed early this morning that both the 32-bit and 64-bit flavors had been leaked to various P2P networks.

http://blogs.zdnet.com/hardware/?p=4218&tag=nl.e589

6 music services compared: Who can bust the iTunes monopoly?

Ed Bott: After sampling all the major U.S.-based rivals to the iTunes Music Store, as well as a few fascinating minor-league competitors, I now have a new favorite music service. See how each one stacks up in terms of pricing and features.

http://blogs.zdnet.com/Bott/?p=862

8 Tips for Choosing an SEO Professional

The checklist in this article will help you choose the right specialist for your search engine marketing campaigns. 1. Stay away from agencies/companies that guarantee top rankings. If you’ve been in the business long enough, you know that there are few guarantees with search engine marketing. No company can guarantee top natural rankings on Google, Yahoo!, MSN or any other search engine.

http://www.practicalecommerce.com/articles/1066-8-Tips-for-Choosing-an-SEO-Professional

Conficker's estimated cost? $9.1 billion

Dancho Danchev: The study factors in the (wasted) time, resources, and energies of the cyber-community, governments, companies and individuals. Plus, Conficker is still active and infecting.

http://blogs.zdnet.com/security/?p=3207&tag=nl.e589

STOP YELLING ACROSS THE HOUSE

Underwear Dust

One evening a Husband, thinking he was being funny, said to his wife, 'Perhaps we should start washing your clothes in 'Slim Fast'. Maybe it would take a few inches off of your butt!?'

His wife was not amused, and decided that she simply couldn't let such a comment go unrewarded.

The next morning the husband took a pair of underwear out of his drawer. 'What the Hell is this?' he said to himself as a little 'dust' cloud appeared when he shook them out.

'April', he hollered into the bathroom, 'Why did you put Talcum Powder in my underwear?'

She replied,?'It's not talcum powder; it's Miracle Grow'

To Those of You Born 1930 - 1979

At the end of this e-mail is a quote of the month by Jay Leno. If youdon't read anything else, please read what he said.

Very well stated, Mr. Leno.

TO ALL THE KIDS WHO SURVIVED THE
1930s, '40s, '50s, '60s and '70s!!

First, we survived being born to mothers who smoked and/or drank whilethey were pregnant.

They took aspirin, ate blue cheese dressing, tuna from a can and didn'tget tested for diabetes.

Then after that trauma, we were put to sleep on our tummies in babycribs covered with bright colored lead-base paints.

We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, locks on doors orcabinets and when we rode our bikes, we had baseball caps not helmets on our heads.

As infants & children, we would ride in cars with no car seats, nobooster seats, no seat belts, no air bags, bald tires and sometimes no brakes.

Riding in the back of a pickup truck on a warm day was always a special treat.

We drank water from the garden hose and not from a bottle.

We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle and no oneactually died from this.

We ate cupcakes, white bread, real butter and bacon. We drank Kool-Aidmade with real white sugar. And, we weren't overweight. WHY?

Because we were always outside playing…that's why!

We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we wereback when the streetlights came on.

No one was able to reach us all day. And, we were O.K.

We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps and then ridethem down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes. After runninginto the bushes a few times, we learned to solve the problem.

We did not have PlayStations, Nintendos and Xboxes. There were no videogames, no 150 channels on cable, no video movi es or DVDs, nosurround-sound or CDs, no cell phones, no personal computers, noInternet and no chat rooms. WE HAD FRIENDS and we went outside and found them!

We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth and there were nolawsuits from these accidents.

We ate worms and mud pies made from dirt, and the worms did not live inus forever.

We were given BB guns for our 10th birthdays, made up games with sticksand tennis balls and, although we were told it would happen, we did notput out very many eyes.

We rode bikes or walked to a friend's house and knocked on the door orrang the bell, or just walked in and talked to them.

Little League had tryouts and not everyone made the team. Those who didn't had to learn to deal with disappointment..

Imagine that!!

The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke the law was unheard of.They actually sided with the law!

These generations have produced some of the best risk takers, problemsolvers and inventors ever.

The past 50 years have been an explosion of innovation and new ideas.

We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned howto deal with it all. If YOU are one of them, CONGRATULATIONS!

You might want to share this with others who have had the luck to growup as kids, before the lawyers and the government regulated so much ofour lives for our own good.

While you are at it, forward it to your kids so they will know how braveand lucky their parents were.


Kind of makes you want to run through the house with scissors, doesn'tit?

~

The quote of the month is by Jay Leno:

'With hurricanes, tornadoes, fires out of control, mud slides, flooding,severe thunderstorms tearing up the country from one end to another, andwith the threat of bird flu and terrorist attacks, are we sure this is agood time to take God out of the Pledge of Allegiance?'

For those that prefer to think that God is not watching over us…go ahead and delete this. For the rest of us… pass this on.

Windows 8 coming into focus

Mary Jo Foley: Windows 7 isn't even here yet, but Microsoft already has laid plans for its replacement in two to three years. In fact, the company just put out a help wanted post for Windows 8 developers.

http://blogs.zdnet.com/microsoft/?p=2559&tag=nl.e539

Microsoft Announces Office 2010 Suite

'Ready to burn up Office tasks, the first bits of Office 14, are coming this year, branded as Office 2010 products.' -

Microsoft's industry leading document and productivity suite, Microsoft Office, has seen new competition from the likes of Mozilla (Thunderbird), Open Office, Google (Google Docs, GMail), and others. However, Microsoft continues to lead the way in both revenue and user base, and is working hard to push the boundaries of the Office product.

http://www.insidetech.com/news/articles/4573-microsoft-announces-office-2010-suite?utm_source=nlet&utm_content=it_r1_20090417_of11

Will Windows 7 be Microsoft's biggest business hit ever?

Last week, the Internet echo chamber went crazy over the release of a survey conducted by Dimensional Research on behalf of its client KACE. The survey asked more than 1100 IT professionals about their plans to deploy Windows 7, and the headlines, based on a few preliminary reports, were a predictable mish-mash of Microsoft bashing. The most common themes in the hundred or more stories I scanned (most of them second- or third-hand reports, based on the same preliminary press releases) suggested that businesses are wary of Windows 7 and that IT admins prefer XP.

http://blogs.zdnet.com/Bott/?p=826&tag=nl.e589

Building a high-performance Windows 7 PC

With Windows 7 release candidate just around the corner, the other day I was asked to spec out a high performance PC suitable for Windows 7 64-bit, This system would also be a great Vista system.

http://blogs.zdnet.com/hardware/?p=4154&tag=nl.e539

Selling (And Socializing) On Facebook

Facebook offers ecommerce companies an opportunity to both market their products and connect with their customers. Traffic to Facebook has increased by 149% from February 2008 to February 2009, according to Hitwise, and it’s not just from the young crowd. Visitors over age 35 have increased by 23% over the same time frame. . .

http://www.practicalecommerce.com/articles/1055-Selling-And-Socializing-On-Facebook

What Separates a Blogger from a Journalist?

Bloggers as Local News Sources

The New York Times is running an article looking at "hyperlocal" web sites as replacements to traditional newspapers. The catalyst for the concept is obviously the fact that some newspapers have been dying off, at least in print form.

The piece looks at web startups EveryBlock, Outside.in, Placebologger, and Patch, which "collect links to articles and blogs and often supplement them with data from local governments and other sources." It is an interesting look into some possibilities for local news options beyond the local paper.

http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2009/04/13/what-separates-a-blogger-from-a-journalist

Is Twitter an Ecommerce Tool?

I hear it a lot. People say they know they should use Twitter for marketing purposes, but the idea of “Twittering” doesn’t sit well with them. On a personal level, I have no interest in letting the world know what I’m doing hour-to-hour, much less moment-to-moment. But Twittering on behalf of a company, ecommerce websites included, can make a lot of sense.

http://www.practicalecommerce.com/articles/1049-Is-Twitter-an-Ecommerce-Tool-

The AP's Desperate Attempt To Outlaw Search Engine Links

The AP is launching an all out assault on any use of its content that is not licensed (purchased) for use by Internet publishers and search engines. As I have said in the past, the AP is not just focusing on the blatant violators such as spam blogs or sites that quote paragraphs without attribution or link. On the contrary, the AP is specifically going after bigger mainstream blogs, Internet publications and believe it or not search engines such as Google.

http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2009/04/06/the-aps-desperate-attempt-to-outlaw-linking

Is Gmail Google's Real Social Network?

Assessing Gmail After Five Years

The Past

Google's email service Gmail was launched to the public five years ago this week. Back then, the service turned the web email industry on its ear by offering an entire gigabyte of storage to users who were lucky enough to receive an invite. Small potatoes now, but that was a nice chunk of storage from an email service back then.

http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2009/04/03/is-gmail-googles-real-social-network

Exclusive: Getting Into Website Sponsorships

Our society has become saturated with traditional display advertising. Consumers have learned to tune out, or even pay to omit ads altogether. Product placement and sponsorship are appearing more than ever in radio, television and motion pictures. Each day the products and entertainment we love are becoming more entangled in each other’s success. Naturally, the same advertising shift is taking place online.

http://www.websitemagazine.com/content/blogs/posts/pages/getting-into-website-sponsorships.aspx

Stuck in the Social Media Vaccuum?

Social media is all the buzz these days. Media outlets, marketers, TV and business magazines (including this one) tout the power of social media to reach the public, shape opinion and even change how we do business. And it's true, social media has changed the way we operate as businesses and how we interact with consumers. Perhaps even more important is how consumers now interact with us. But are we giving too much weight to a crowd of social media users who represent a relatively small portion of the overall population?

http://www.websitemagazine.com/content/blogs/website_magazine_consumer_corner/archive/2009/03/31/stuck-in-the-social-media-vaccuum.aspx

Tons of Tips for Ranking in 5 Other Google Engines

It's not all about traffic. It's about conversions. But it's hard to get conversions if you don't have the traffic, and while Google is one of the best potential sources for traffic, Google has other search engines besides web search that people use all the time, and it will not hurt to rank in them too.

http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2009/04/01/tons-of-tips-for-ranking-in-5-other-google-engines

Ecommerce Know-How: Selecting a Web Designer or Developer

Often with ecommerce sites success is not a matter of how good you are but rather how good you look.

Consumers often judge how professional and how trustworthy an online store is by nothing more than its aesthetics. While many online retailers are experts in their field (i.e., apparel, tools, and toys), they are not necessarily experts in graphic design or website development. They know all about the products they sell, but they may not know much about, say, white space, alpha transparency, or PHP.

http://www.practicalecommerce.com/articles/1036-Ecommerce-Know-How-Selecting-a-Web-Designer-or-Developer

The Successful Approach to Application Lifecycle Management

Like a human life, an application's lifecycle is demarcated by significant events. It begins with an idea that gets created. The next big event is deployment, and finally, when it no longer has business value, the application reaches end of life and is removed from service.

http://whitepapers.zdnet.com/abstract.aspx?docid=928239&promo=590&tag=nl.e590

Google Display Ad Builder Improves With Rich Media & Video

Google made several notable improvements to its AdWords display ad builder, with a focus on bringing richer content, interaction and tracking to display ads.

http://www.websitemagazine.com/content/blogs/posts/archive/2009/04/01/google-display-ad-builder-improves-with-rich-media-amp-video.aspx

Getting More Blog Readers and Twitter Followers

Of people who both blog and tweet, the majority would overwhelmingly prefer to have more blog readers than followers on Twitter. This is according to surveys conducted by Darren Rowse who runs ProBlogger and TwiTip.

http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2009/03/30/getting-more-blog-readers-and-twitter-followers